


Harry Potter: A Lifetime Original Movie

by ariana_reuts



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Bisexual Draco Malfoy, F/M, Gen, M/M, Marriage, Meta, Multi, Other, Romance, Romantic Comedy, Teacher-Student Relationship, Teen Pregnancy, The Author Regrets Nothing, Unplanned Pregnancy, its a paraody, like basically all the characters have a weird romance, lots of weird relationships, nothing graphic, so many weird pairings, talk of underage sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-09
Updated: 2019-09-09
Packaged: 2020-10-13 13:35:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 26
Words: 48,839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20583353
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ariana_reuts/pseuds/ariana_reuts
Summary: Written prior to HBP. After Dumbledore dies taking down Lord Voldemort, all Harry wants is a chance to lead a normal life. Unfortunately for Harry, Hermione is pregnant, Snape has crowned himself headmaster, and things are getting weirder than ever...All the pairings... All the Drama... Author had no shame!Originally Posted to FF.net roughly 10 years agoThere is also an incomplete sequel... not sure if i'll be posting it though





	1. The Woes of Hermione Granger

Hermione's face turned a very violent shade of green. Madam Pomfrey stood there with a pitying look on her face, clearly unsure of what to say. It was very possible that she had dealt with this sort of thing on numerous occasions, but this time she was totally dumbfounded. Some of the other girls got pregnant, but not smart ones like Hermione Granger.

Hermione sat on the hospital bed, silent tears pouring down her cheeks. Madam Pomfrey patted her shoulder. She wanted to know exactly how Hermione felt about the pregnancy before she asked her the same question she asked all the other girls with this specific problem. She thought it over in her mind for a moment, then asked a different question.

"Who is the father, dear?" She didn't think it was a very good idea to go any further without knowing the father of the child. "Is it Harry? Is Harry Potter the father?"

There was a strangled yelp from the bed across the room. Draco Malfoy's pale, pointed face appeared from behind the white curtains. He fell off the bed, entangling himself in the curtains as he did so, and hurried to free himself.

"OMG!" He shouted, making a giant leap for the doors, throwing them open, running as fast as he could all the way down the corridor back towards the Great Hall, screaming shrilly as he went. His hair was still slightly purple from the hex Harry had performed earlier.

Madam Pomfrey darted over to the open doors, looking stunned and terrified.

"DRACO MALFOY YOU GET BACK HERE THIS INSTANT!" She bellowed at the top of her lungs. Hermione sobbed into her hands; she knew that there was no way Madam Pomfrey would ever have a chance at catching him. As soon as he reached the Great Hall, her reputation at Hogwarts would be shattered.

She continued to cry in this way until Madam Pomfrey came back into the Hospital Wing, looking pale and guilty.

Suddenly, a new thought occurred to her.

"OH MY GOD!" She whispered to herself furiously.

"Hermione," said Madam Pomfrey. "I think it would be a very good idea if you sat down."

But Hermione was also too quick for Madam Pomfrey, and she slipped right out the door as quickly as Draco had.

"Oh, come on!" she shouted after Hermione, whose form was quickly fading away in the dark hall. "I'm trying to help, you know!"

Hermione ran straight past the Great Hall, the kitchens, and the library all the way back to the Gryffindor common room without stopping to take a breath. "Frange femur!" she shouted at the Fat Lady, and the portrait swung open.

Ginny was sitting in a chair reading a book. She waved at Hermione, but Hermione didn't even notice it. She started to make her way up the stairs to where Harry and Ron slept, taking them three at a time.

"RON!" She shouted, bursting into the room. To her great disappointment, the room was empty except for Harry, who was sitting on his bed reading a book. He looked up slowly, glanced at her, looked up again, and finally registered her shabby state in his head.

"Hermione? What is it? What's wrong?"

She was clutching her side, taking in gasps of air, looking as if she was about to faint.

"Ron! Just found out…" she took a gasp of air, looking close to tears. "…And Draco! Found out…he was in the hospital...wing…and, he heard…he heard everything!" She was hysterical. "And Harry! Harry he thinks it was you!"

Harry stared at her from his bed, not really sure where to start asking question.

"Ok…what?" He asked, putting the book down and getting out of his bed. He tried to help her into a chair, but she was gasping for air and about to fall over.

Then she started bawling and babbling at the same time. He couldn't understand her for a minute, until he heard one word that stood out from all her meaningless rambles.

"Wait a minute…did you just say…did you just say…" he couldn't bring himself to say the word. "Pregnant?"

She let out a howl and buried her face in her hands, but he could tell that she was nodding, even through her sobs.

However, as Hermione was making her mad dash towards the common room, Ron was searching the courtyard madly for his sister, who he had heard was out with Dean Thomas. He didn't trust Dean at all, and was very aware of the kind of things that could go on in bushes, having experienced them himself on a number of occasions.

Just as he was doing so, Pansy Parkinson and a number of her pale, evil-looking Slytherin she-devils came out into the courtyard, spotted him, and started giggling to each other like mad. He could have sworn that all eight of them were staring directly at him, although there was rarely a reason for anybody to be looking at him. He thought for a moment that they were probably all still angry over what Harry had done to Malfoy earlier that afternoon, but he couldn't understand why they would be smiling about that. He stared at them uneasily, wished quickly that they would go away, and went back to calling for Ginny.

It was clear that they were not going to leave. In fact, they seemed to be seeking him out.

"That's a real shame what happened to your friends," said Pansy, an evil grin spreading across her face, which was mostly unattractive.

Ron stared at her, narrowing his eyes as the Slytherin girls all walked over to him slowly. He was very aware how out-numbered he was.

"What are you talking about," he said, sounding a little worried.

"You don't know?" asked Pansy, still grinning foully. "They didn't even tell you?"

A tiny laugh rippled through the rest of the group. Ron stared at them quizzically, unable to tell if they were serious or trying to play some kind of sick joke on him. Something about the look on Pansy's face bothered him; she didn't normally go out of her way to talk to him.

"Goodness. The whole school knows by now. Even Draco knew, and they didn't even bother to tell you?"  
The look on Ron's face was very different from the one they had expected. He knew that the "they" Pansy had to be talking about was Harry and Hermione, and felt he was more than obligated to know what was going on between the two of them.

"What happened."

Pansy was disappointed by this reaction.

"She's pregnant."

Ron's jaw dropped. For a minute, he completely forgot where he was and why he was outside.

"She…what? She's WHAT?"

Pansy sneered at him, folded her arms, and sighed.

"Draco overheard her telling Madam Pomfrey that Harry's the father."

For a moment, he barely recalled hearing this. In the end, it was what finally snapped him out of his trance.

"Wait a minute…HARRY?"

He looked very angry now. Pansy had been expecting him to cry or something, but certainly not get angry.

He walked toward them, but Pansy wouldn't get out of his path.

"GET. OUT. OF. MY. WAY. NOW."

She glared at him.

"Make me!"

Ron made a grab for his wand. Pansy did the same, but he beat her to it. He didn't even have to say anything; she blew off the ground as if a strong wind had pushed her out of Ron's way. She flipped through the air, screaming, and landed safely in the lake nearby. The other Slytherins took one look at his wand, screamed at the top of their lungs, and scattered off into many different directions.

Ron barely heard them. He stormed off to the castle, running as fast as he could. He looked angrier now than he ever had before; his eyes were slits, his hands were balled into fists, and his face was growing redder by the second. He didn't notice the people looking at him or pointing as he passed; they all knew about it by now. Miraculously, they all seemed to speed out of his way as soon as he came around a corner.

He yelled the password at the fat lady, who gave him a disapproving look.

He didn't see Ginny, but she saw him. He stormed up the stairs and she followed; she had been in the common room for hours and was completely oblivious.

Ron slammed into the door; it too miraculously seemed to jump out of his way. He took one look at Harry, who was sitting on the bed with a calmer Hermione.

He lifted one of his balled fists and pointed a shaking finger at Harry.

"YOU."

Hermione's face turned green again. Harry took in Ron's red face, wand, and shaking hand, understood instantly, and automatically fumbled around for his wand.

"Ron, listen—"

"I AM GOING TO KILL YOU SO MUCH!" Bellowed Ron, interrupting Hermione.

"Ron, STOP!" Yelled Harry, lifting his wand a little as Ron walked slowly over toward him, looking more and more like an angry dog by the second. "Malfoy didn't hear what he thought! He was—"

Ron leapt at him, completely abandoning his wand. Harry had no time to react, and they both fell to the floor; Ron attacking him and Harry doing his best to fight him off and fish for his wand at the same time. Ginny was screaming behind them and Hermione was sobbing again, trying to grab onto Ron's arms and pull him away.

In an instant, Neville, Seamus, and Dean all appeared at the door. They all looked anxious, but not at all surprised to see what was going on in the room. They darted across the room, pulled Ron off of Harry slowly, and held him back as best they could at the other end. Ginny was no longer screaming, but she was staring at them, both terrified and confused. Hermione was across the room, desperately trying to calm Ron down. Ron was still screaming curses and hexes at Harry, but his wand was safely on the other side of his bed, out of sight.

Neville and Seamus were still trying their best to restrain him, but it was very difficult. Slowly, Harry got to his feet, looking for his glasses, which had snapped in half. He looked very different without his glasses on, and was now quite angry.

"WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOU!" He yelled at Ron, no longer concerned about Ron's well being. "Are you completely INSANE?"

"WHAT'S WRONG WITH ME? WHAT'S WRONG WITH ME? YOU'RE THE ONE WHO GOT MY GIRLFRIEND PREGNANT YOU STUPID BLOODY PRAT!"

"I DIDN'T GET HER PREGNANT YOU IDIOT!" Harry bellowed. "YOU GOT HER PREGNANT YOU FLAMING GIT!"

Ginny took this opportunity to glance at Hermione, flabbergasted. Hermione blushed and avoided her eyes.

Ron still looked angry, but his eyes were suddenly filled with confusion. He stopped struggling for a moment, looked at Hermione, and said "What?"

Hermione cleared her throat nervously.

"I was…down in the hospital wing and Draco overheard Madam Pomfrey and I having a…conversation," she shot an awkward look at Seamus, Dean, and Neville, who all looked as if they would rather not be in the room. "He ran off and told everyone that Harry was…was…the reason for, my…for me being in the hospital wing."

She cleared her throat again.

Ron stood in the corner of the room for a minute, staring at her. Beating up Harry seemed like a very easy way to deal with his anger and surprise, but now that he knew Hermione's current…situation was not Harry's fault, but indeed, his fault, he didn't really know what to say or do.

Harry was still standing in the corner, looking sour and holding his broken glasses.

Ginny coughed nervously.

"Dean, Seamus, Neville…I think everything's alright in here now."

They were glad for the excuse to leave, let go of Ron immediately, and took off out the door.

Harry also decided it was a good time for him to leave. Ron was staring at Hermione, they both looked a little uneasy. He followed after Ginny, closed the door, and went into the common room.

That night, Harry, Neville, Seamus, Dean, and Ginny all slept in the oversized chairs. They didn't go back into their room until early the next day when Hermione appeared at the bottom of the stairs, sprinted across the room, leapt up towards her own dormitory and vanished.


	2. The Pocket Crossword of Severus Snape

Harry had a horrible crick in his neck all the next day from sleeping in the oversized chair in the common room. It was normally very comfortable to sit in, but no one should ever have to sleep curled up like a cat.

He was very grumpy as he changed into his robes the next morning. He looked for his wand; he had lost it yesterday in the fight with Ron, and didn't have the opportunity to look for it since they were kicked out of the room.

Ron walked into the room, also looking very grumpy and tired. Harry felt a sharp stab of resentment; Ron wasn't the one who had to sleep in the common room, after all. He was hunched over and had dark circles around his eyes. He was also muttering something to himself under his breath.

"Oh," he said lazily as he spotted Harry.

"Oh," said Harry, mimicking him.

Ron turned a deep shade of purple. He looked away, still mumbling, and went to collect his old books.

"Have a good night?" Asked Harry bitterly, still searching. Already, the year was starting to look tiring.

"Look, Harry," said Ron, scratching the back of his neck uncomfortably. "I'm really sorry about what happened…yesterday. I heard it  
from Pansy and she was…you know…being Pansy…and I just sort of—"

"Forget about it, it's no big deal," said Harry. He was used to being beaten up anyway.

Ron couldn't really tell if he was being sincere or not.

"So what happened?"

"What?" asked Ron.

"With Hermione? Last night?"

"Oh," said Ron, suddenly looking very depressed. "She says we have to tell my mum."

Harry was suddenly very glad that he was not Ron. He liked Mrs. Weasley, but he was very afraid of her also. He hated to think what would happen if it had been him.

"So, when are you telling them?"

"Well, Hermione and I have to talk to Snape…" He shuddered. "We have to have permission to leave the school grounds for a weekend. Then we have to come up with some way to get the Grangers to the Burrow without being too obvious about what's going on…"

Harry cracked a smile.

"Why don't you just write them a letter or something?"

Ron rolled his eyes again. "No, Hermione says that we have to show them that we're 'responsible adults', and that means telling them in person. I know she's not worried, no one's going to be mad at her…she's the girl…"

Ron stood there in the center of the room, scared stiff. Harry had a feeling he was imagining Mrs. Weasley's expression in his head.  
They left the common room and walked down towards the Great Hall. He was very aware that people were looking at them and pointing. He tried to remain as straight faced as possible, but it was hard when a bunch of younger girls kept looking at him and bursting into fits of hysterical giggles.

When they walked into the Great Hall, Hermione was already sitting at the table. A huge crowd of girls, ones from every house, surrounded her; all of them were talking among each other adamantly, glancing at Hermione occasionally. A few of the girls were talking to Hermione, including Ginny and Luna.

As Harry approached, some of the girls stopped and started to whisper in even lower voices.

"I already told you!" Shouted Hermione, glaring at them.

Ron was looking sour again because the girls were all staring at Harry instead of him; he obviously wanted credit for his work.

"So Harry," said Lavender. "Hermione's not telling us anything. Maybe you could spare us some details."

Harry glanced at Ron and cleared his throat.

"Hermione and I are not having a baby," he said, glaring at them, with a 'and-that's-the-end-of-the-matter' tone in his voice. The girls all looked disappointed.

"But you should talk to Ron, though," he finished, sitting down.

The devilish shine came back into the girls' eyes.

"HARRY!" Shouted both Ron and Hermione.

A couple of the girls ran off down the Great Hall, looking for their friends. Harry didn't care; Neville, Seamus, Dean, and Ginny all knew and if it didn't get spread around now, it would later.

Suddenly, everybody in the Great Hall went quiet. Snape was standing at the front of the Great Hall, looking stern, pale, and angry as usual.

"Good morning," he said in his cold, drawling voice. Harry had a feeling that Snape had never wished someone 'good morning' before in his entire life. "Today you will begin your classes…"

Harry tuned out Snape's voice and started to remember the night before at the sorting, when Snape suddenly got up and announced himself the headmaster in the unfortunate event of Dumbledore's death…

Thinking of Dumbledore caused him to feel a sharp jab of pain…

"…and I'm sure all of you will be more than willing to obey these rules."

Harry wondered for a moment if maybe he should have been listening to the rules…

A few of the Slytherins clapped as he disappeared from the front of the room with a swish of his cloak. Some of the other Slytherins looked sour; in fact, most of the students looked sour.

"What'd he say?" Harry asked Ron.

Hermione scowled. "He said that they're in the process of making the consequences of rule breaking more severe."

"What does that mean?"

"It means," said Ron. "That if you, Hermione, or me even step on one of the school flowers we're going to be expelled."

"This is the worst thing that's ever happened to us," said Hermione in a monotone voice.

"Right, worse than getting pregnant when you're sixteen?" asked Ron.

Hermione glared at him with the utmost contempt.

"Well…at least Voldemort is gone," said Harry bitterly. "That's something."

"I just still wish we had our headmaster, nonetheless…" said Hermione, trailing off.

Ron stared at his cereal, frowning. "It doesn't really make much sense, though…I mean, I thought you were supposed to defeat Voldemort…"

Harry shrugged. He didn't really understand it either. The words but he will have powers that the dark lord knows not…trailed through his brain. Was Dumbledore supposed to be the power Voldemort didn't know about? But surely Voldemort had known about him and Dumbledore…Harry loved Dumbledore…

Harry, Hermione, and Ron walked to their first class, Potions. They were all very excited; they had never experienced a Potions class without Snape before.

Their new professor, Madam Galadra, was a very tall, white haired woman. She was very young; a lot younger than any of the other professors. Seamus, Dean, and Neville were all sitting at the very front of the room, staring at her with blank expressions.

She reminded Harry of Fleur Delacour, except her hair had no pigment in it at all, and her skin glowed white. She had a very long nose and wide, staring eyes. For a moment, she stopped being beautiful and looked a little frightening.

He noticed that the Slytherin boys were also staring at her and wondered if maybe she was part Veela too. Even some of the girls were looking at her, as if wondering if some spell could make their skin glow.

Ron was very interested in the new teacher too; Hermione slapped his shoulder and glared at him.

They sat down at a table close to the back. The Potions room looked very different without Snape in it; suddenly, it wasn't as dark, and the usual assortment of jars with gross-looking things inside were mostly cleared away. Hermione and Harry traded uneasy looks. They wondered what the class was going to be like now.

"Good morning," said Madam Galadra in a very quiet, flowing voice. The boys drooled. Somewhere next to him, Harry could hear Hermione hitting Ron again. "This morning we will be making Invisibility potions. The ingredients are on the board," she said, waving her wand. The instructions appeared.

"I must warn you that these potions are nowhere near powerful enough to make yourselves invisible, so unless you want a very uncomfortable stomach ache, I wouldn't test it on each other.

"If you have any questions, I will be at my desk. Feel free to ask me for anything…"

The class started whispering each other, unsure of what would be going on in this class. They didn't know if they would be allowed to talk…Snape had never allowed them to do anything…

The door opened behind them as soon as Harry started to get out his cauldron. Professor McGonagall was standing in the doorway, looking more tight-lipped than usual.

"Madam Galadra, may I borrow Mr. Potter and Miss. Granger for a moment?"

The class started to snicker. Ron looked angry again as Hermione and Harry walked out the door. He looked like he was about to follow, but decided he might as well wait until he knew what McGonagall really wanted.

The professor closed the door, still looking stern.

"I heard a very unpleasant rumor today in the headmaster's office, Potter. I sincerely hope I was misinformed."

"No!" said Harry. "Not me!"

"What?" said McGonagall, narrowing her eyes. She stared at Hermione for a moment. Hermione didn't say anything, only stared at the floor, blushing.

"Who, then?"

"Ron," muttered Hermione.

"Mr. Potter," said Professor McGonagall, suddenly looking much angrier. "You may go back to class. If you would be so kind, please send out Mr. Weasley."

Harry headed back through the door. Ron looked pale.

"McGonagall wants to see you, Ron." He knew that the three things that scared Ron the most were spiders, Mrs. Weasley, and Professor McGonagall.

"Bloody hell," muttered Ron, getting up slowly. The girls behind them giggled.

He headed out the door that McGonagall was holding open, glaring at him. It shut sharply.

"YOU TWO ARE PREFECTS!" McGonagall shouted. The rest of the class suppressed their laughter as best they could. The old professor might as well have not shut the door at all.

"I OUGHT TO WRITE TO YOUR MOTHER THIS INSTANT…"

The voice trailed away as the three walked away down the corridor, McGonagall yelling all the way. Harry stared around at the rest of the class. They were looking at him and whispering to each other.

Madam Galadra acted like nothing had happened. She was helping Neville, who wasn't paying attention to her words in the least, with the complicated potion. Seamus and Dean were also watching her, marveling at how close she was.

Harry was rummaging through his things, searching for his vile of crushed tortoise shell. He figured at last that he must have left it in his trunk in all the fuss of looking for his wand.

He got up from his spot, went to Madam Galadra, and waited for her to stop talking to Neville.

"Is there something I can help you with, Mr. Potter?"

In spite of himself, he blushed.

"Er…I um, left my tortoise shell in my dormitory. May I borrow some?"

"Certainly," she said, writing instructions on a piece of parchment for Neville. "There's some in the Potions closet. You're welcome to get some yourself…I'm sorry if it's a little dirty, I haven't had time to clean it yet."

He looked nervously at what had been Snape's prized Potions closet, feeling uneasy. He wasn't really used to having Madam Galadra for a professor.

He went into the potions closet. It was still very old and dusty, like it had been when Professor Snape was their teacher. He searched the stacked wooden shelves quickly, having the unpleasant feeling that the greasy-haired git was still watching him.

A gnarled wooden basket sat on a small wooden stool in the corner of the room; next to it was an old blackened desk. On the desk was a piece of newsprint, and he recognized the very dark, sharply curved letters that were professor Snape's. It was a crossword; Harry had a hard time believing that Snape would ever do anything as normal as finish a crossword.

On the bottom of the note, there was something written in what Harry recognized was pencil. Nobody at Hogwarts used pencils, they all used quills.

_Dearest Snivellus,_  
_That doesn't bother you, does it Professor?_  
_Love, Lioness_

Harry stared at the letter for a moment, not really understanding why any person in their right mind would write something like that to Snape. Lioness, he thought, staring at it. Who in the world is Lioness?

He suddenly realized that he had spent far too much time in the potions closet. He grabbed the vile of tortoise shell, and darted out of the room.

Madam Galadra didn't even notice as he walked past, and Hermione and Ron hadn't returned.


	3. The Headmaster's Headmistress

"And so then McGonagall threatened to suspend us, well…actually that was just me. So Hermione had to tell her that we would go home this weekend and tell our parents."

Ron scowled at Hermione.

"I told you no one would blame you! It's always the boy who's the bad one. As if the girl is completely incapable of dragging a boy into the basement while everyone is having tea upstairs!"

She glared at him.

"Hermione," said Harry. "That's a little…a little weird."

"Oh shush up, Harry," she said, hitting Ron. "There are people everywhere at the Burrow. Where else were we—"

"Please don't finish that sentence." Said Harry, looking revolted.

"The shed where we keep the brooms?" asked Ron. Harry feigned throwing up all over the floor of the dormitory.

"Well, Grimmauld place was a lot easier because there were a lot of rooms," said Hermione.

"I really don't want to know anything else!" Harry shouted.

"What about when Mum and Dad went to visit Fred and George and left us alone at the Burrow," asked Ron. "That was kind of a stupid thing to do, wasn't it?"

"We weren't alone," said Hermione. "Ginny was upstairs taking a nap."

"There was that time we went into the attic at Grimmauld Place."

"The study at Grimmauld Place," said Hermione.

"There was that time you hexed Ginny to sleep and came in my room," said Ron.

"SERIOUSLY STOP NOW!"

"Sorry," they both said at the same time.

"Are you two finished? Because I have to tell you about something," he said. Ron was muttering something to himself under his breath, as if trying to remember a number of dates and places.

"Yes?" Asked Hermione.

"Today I had to go in the potions closet—" they both gasped loudly, looking scandalized "—to get some tortoise shell and I found an odd letter on Snape's desk."

Hermione looked interested.

"What did it say?"

"Well…" he trailed off. He had never told Ron and Hermione what he saw in the Pensieve in his fifth year. They wouldn't understand the nickname his father had given Professor Snape. "It was a crossword that Snape cut out of a newspaper. And he had finished it, but on the bottom there was a weird note written in pencil."

"In what?" asked Ron.

"Pencil, Ron. It's a pen you write with, only you can erase it," Hermione explained.

He frowned. "Oh."

"What did it say?"

Harry frowned, wondering if they would believe him if he told them.

"It said…'Dearest Snivellus, that doesn't bother you, does it Professor? Love Lioness'."

Ron looked pained, like he didn't know whether to laugh or ask Harry if this was his idea of a joke.

"Snivellus?" asked Hermione.

"Snape," Harry explained. "It's what my father and Sirius used to call him when they were in school together."

"You're not serious," said Ron finally.

"Yeah," said Harry.

"But…Snape is…" Hermione started.

"Yeah, I know," said Harry. "I couldn't believe it either."

"And that's all it said, was just 'love Lioness'?" Asked Hermione, looking doubtful.

"Do you think it's that new professor?" Asked Ron. "Madam Galadra?"

"Somehow I don't think Madam Galadra is the kind of person to write love notes to Snape," said Harry. "I don't think she's really his type."

"I don't think he's really her type, actually," said Ron. "Snape can't really afford to have a type, can he?"

"Don't be silly, Ronald," said Hermione. "There's someone out there for everybody." She shot him a nasty look. "I wasn't as fortunate as some people."

Ron glared.

"She said 'Lioness', right?" asked Hermione.

"Yeah," said Harry.

"Well…nevermind," she said. Ron narrowed his eyes as he looked at her.

"What?" he demanded.

"Nothing," said Hermione, straightening her skirt. "I mean…you don't think that…erm, well…McGonagall is the Gryffindor head-of-house, and the mascot is a lion…"

"EW!" screeched Ron. Harry shivered.

"No way!" said Harry. "She's like forty years older than him."

"I thought she was married," said Ron. "Didn't they say something about that at the Sorting?"

"Well, Ron, you of all people should know that it's not impossible to have a love affair," said Hermione grumpily.

He wrinkled his nose in disgust.

"I have a good feeling that it wasn't a professor," said Harry.

"Why?" asked Hermione. "Professor Dumbledore always called people 'Professor Sprout', or 'Professor Flitwick'."

"Yeah," he said. "But McGonagall is always calling Snape 'Severus', and Trelawney 'Sybill'."

"Ok, well then that means it could be either one," said Hermione sourly. She sat silently for a moment, staring into nowhere. "So…there's a possibility that it's a Gryffindor then."

"Why on Earth would Snape have an affair with a Gryffindor? He hates all of us," said Ron.

"That's true," said Harry.

"Well…" she trailed off. "Who do we know who could have 'lioness' as a nickname?"

"Hermione, that's like asking 'Who farted?' on a crowded Knight Bus. It could be anybody," said Ron.

Harry suppressed a laugh. Hermione glared at him for the 356,064,445th time that day.

Suddenly, Harry remembered something.

"Didn't Luna have a hat that was shaped like a lion's head?"

Hermione and Ron looked at him for a moment like he was crazy, but slowly, they both started to wonder.

"Luna has always been a little odd, Hermione," said Ron. Hermione nodded a little…

"But surely Luna would have more sense than to…she couldn't possibly…" but even Hermione knew that there was a very good possibility Luna might. She was by far the oddest person they knew.

"Harry," said Ron. "Do you think you'd be able to recognize the handwriting if you saw it again?"

Harry nodded.

"Hermione, you go ask Luna to write down her…address or something, and then bring it back here to show it to Harry!"

"Why do I need to know her address?"

"I don't know," Ron snapped. "Can you think of anything better?"

"Oh!" said Hermione, jumping off of the bed. She disappeared down the staircase.

"I wish she would warn us when she's about to do that," said Ron.

Hermione ran down the stairs and out of the common room. She sprinted down the hallway towards the Great Hall, looking for Luna as she ran past several various rooms. Finally spotting her in the library, she turned sharply and walked inside.

"Luna!" she said, sitting down across from her. "You never gave me the address to that shop in Diagon Alley."

"Oh, yes," said Luna. She put down her book called Minds In Occlumency and fished around in her bag for something to write with.

Hermione appeared in the dormitory a few minutes later, looking smug.

"Well?" said Ron. "Did you get it?"

Hermione shrugged. "Oh, I don't think we're going to need it," she said, smiling in her know-it-all way.

"What do you mean, we're not going to need it?" Asked Ron, scowling at her. "I thought you had an idea!"

"I did, but we're not going to need it," she said, still smiling.

She pulled out the piece of parchment and shoved it under Harry's nose.

"Well?" asked Ron.

"See," she said, pointing at it. Harry was staring at it, looking both dazed and revolted.

"What?" said Ron again, looking annoyed.

"It's written in pencil," said Harry, still staring at it. Ron jumped off his bed and looked over Harry's shoulder.

"Ew," said Ron. "That's…unpleasant and wrong in so many horrible ways." They all stared at the parchment. Hermione was still satisfied with discovering the truth about Luna, but it was starting to fade when she started to register what this meant.

"Well, maybe she isn't dating him," said Hermione hopefully. "Maybe she just has a crush on him or something…"

"How would she know 'Snivellus', though?" said Harry. "I mean, that's not really the sort of thing you go around telling people."


	4. A Very Angry Red-Head

Ron stood in the center of the room, rooted to the floor. Hermione's hands were covering her face. She was shaking. Ron's face was contorted with terror; his face reminded Harry of the time that many large spiders attacked them in the Forbidden Forest.

Ginny was still breathing hard in the doorway. She had a piece of parchment crushed in her hand.

She handed the parchment to Harry, and he read the smudged words written with a very angry hand.

_Ginny,_  
I'm coming to the school.  
I know what's going on.  
-Mum 

Harry felt very bad for Ron. Any lingering resentment he had over the fight yesterday faded as he read the note. Ron's face was purple again and Hermione was rocking back and forth on the bed with her arms rapped around her knees, muttering something about her parents.

"Why do I have to have a mother," said Ron. "Out of all the people in the world…"

"At least you have somebody out there who's at least trying to look out for you," said Harry resentfully. "It must suck to have a mother and a father, jeez."

Ron didn't hear him.

They went down to the Great Hall for dinner. Ginny was still sort of pale, but she was nothing compared to Hermione and Ron.

Although it was by no means the normal time of day to be receiving mail, A small, young looking owl swept into the Great Hall as they were all enjoying their meals.

"Uh-oh," said Ginny, spotting it. "That's George's owl, Spartacus."

Harry saw a bright red envelope sticking out of the bird's beak and knew what could only be coming. Ron, Hermione, and Ginny were all staring at it with horror. Draco Malfoy, Pansy Parkinson, Crabbe, Goyle, and a number of other students were all pointing at it, unsure where it would land, but all eagerly hoping it belonged to Ron.

It fluttered above the Gryffindor table and fell, as the entire hall watched, onto Ron's plate.

"Oh, bloody hell," said Ron. Hermione was crying across the table.

"RON'S GOT A HOWLER!" Screamed a Slytherin. The students started to applaud.

"Open it, Ron!"

"C'mon, we want to hear!"

"Ron, do it, quick, before they stop talking," Neville said.

Ron opened the flap of the envelope. It sprang out of his hand.

"IS THAT REALLY ACCEPTABLE BEHAVIOR FOR A PREFECT?" Howled Fred's voice through what sounded like a fit of laughter.

"It's not like anybody couldn't figure it out," said George loudly.

"I mean, there was that time we saw you two making out in the shed—"

"The basement—"

"Your room—"

"The study—"

"Ginny's room—"

"EW!" Shrieked Ginny, looking positively revolted. "GROSS!"

"Not to mention all those times in the bushes," added George.

"The Potions closet—"

"Don't act like nobody knew," said George. "I guess you thought you were being clever?"

"Thanks bunches, Ginny, we owe you one."

The howler erupted in flames and the rest of the Great Hall, who had been squealing with laughter all the way through, burst into applause once more.

Hermione had her face buried in her arms, Ron was so embarrassed you could feel the heat coming from him, and Ginny was trying her best to look innocent. She seemed to be suffering from a massive internal struggle, as if she didn't know whether she should feel bad about ratting on them or vindicated after what she found out they had been doing in her room.

"GINNY!" shouted Ron. "What'd you have to tell them for!"

Her struggle seemed to be resolved.

"How could you be doing…that in my room!"

Hermione lifted her head and smiled apologetically.

"Great, are they the ones who told mum?" Asked Ron scathingly, glaring at her. "You're the twit who ratted us out, then!"

"I didn't!" She said. She looked as if she'd been slapped. "For your information, Snape was the one who told Mum and Dad."

"You don't honestly expect me to believe that, do you!" Snapped Ron.

"It's true! Right before I received that letter from Mum, I heard Snape telling Draco Malfoy that he had made sure that the 'poor, shamed parents' of you two deserved to know what was going on."

Hermione gasped.

"Not! Not…! MY PARENTS TOO?"

Ginny shrugged. "I don't know, Hermione! I haven't heard anything except what I got from Mum."

"You still didn't have to run off telling Fred and George, Ginny," said Ron, still very unhappy with her. "You could have—"

"What, do you think it's better that Mum tells them?"

Ron sank back in his chair, defeated.

Harry got up from the table and decided to take some time off from the rest of the Gryffindors. All the commotion was giving him an awful, throbbing headache. He headed out of the Great Hall and down towards the courtyard where he could get a breath of fresh air.

"I DON'T CARE WHAT THE RULES ARE, I WANT TO TALK TO THEM NOW!"

Harry recognized the voice of Mrs. Weasley instantly. She had arrived at the school earlier than he had expected; he wasn't expecting her to show up until tomorrow at least.

"DON'T SPEAK TO ME THAT WAY, I'M NOT A CHILD!"

Harry came around the corner and saw Mrs. Weasley and Professor McGonagall standing outside the entrance to Hogwarts. Mrs. Weasley had her fists clenched at her sides. She looked very pale, thin, and her hair was all disheveled. She was glaring at McGonagall, something no normal person would ever attempt.

"Mrs. Weasley, you cannot simply barge in here to yell at young Mr. Weasley in front of his classmates," said McGonagall sternly. "When you are calm, I will send for him."

"HARRY!" Said Mrs. Weasley, spotting him. "Harry, tell that worthless excuse for a Weasley to come out here this instant! You'd better get Hermione, too."

"Mr. Potter, don't move," said McGonagall.

Harry thought this was a very mean thing for both of them to do. Either betray McGonagall or betray Mrs. Weasley, and he wasn't fond of being on either side of their tempers.

Mrs. Weasley glared at McGonagall, but soon Harry didn't have to decide either way.

"Hey Harry, where are you—"

Ron came around the corner, spotted his mother, and froze. Ginny appeared shortly, followed by Hermione and Seamus.

He turned to run.

"DON'T YOU DARE!" Screamed Mrs. Weasley. She had been angry before, but seeing her son inspired something completely different in her. "GET DOWN HERE RIGHT NOW!"

Seeing the look on Mrs. Weasley's face stopped McGonagall. She decided to step aside and not to interfere; unless, of course, Mrs. Weasley decided she wanted to kill him or something.

Hermione followed Ron down into the courtyard unwillingly. Neither of them said anything, and for once, Hermione didn't try defending either of them.

"OUT OF ALL THE STUPID THINGS YOUR BROTHERS HAVE DONE NOTHING, AND I MEAN NOTHING, IS AS BAD AS THIS! WHAT ON EARTH COULD YOU POSSIBLY HAVE BEEN THINKING! Of course, nobody blames you Hermione. OUT OF ALL THE TIMES FRED AND GEORGE HAVE ALMOST GOTTEN THEMSELVES EXPELLED AND YOU GO AND TOP ALL OF THAT! I'VE NEVER BEEN MORE ASHAMED OF ANYONE IN MY WHOLE LIFE! DID IT EVER OCCUR TO EITHER OF YOU THAT THIS IS NOT THE THING WE NEED TO BE DEALING WITH RIGHT NOW! First Dumbledore dies and...and..."

Mrs Weasley took this opportunity to crumble into loud, obnoxious wails. Through her crying, Harry could hear a lot about the Dark Lord, Dumbledore, Percy, Ron, a baby, and Mr. Weasley. Harry wasn't entirely sure why she was crying about Mr. Weasley, who had been the new Minister of Magic since Scrimgeour's death at Voldemort's hands earlier in the summer.

By this time, a number of students had started to crowd around in the doorway. They were all pressing their ears up to the glass, although they probably could have heard her anyway.

Harry stood awkwardly in the courtyard. He looked around and spotted Romilda Vane who winked at him and smiled evilly.

Harry turned away sharply and spotted Ginny, who was red in the face and suppressing many violent giggles. She saw Harry and stopped suddenly, embarrassed, and looked away (though she did still look severely amused).

Professor McGonagall lead Ron, Hermione, and Mrs. Weasley (who she had gripped firmly by the arm) into the school building. Mrs. Weasley was still having small fits of anger, sadness, and remorse as they walked through the noisy and closely watching hall packed with students.

Harry walked down the steps and didn't go inside. He had wanted to have a little time on his own, away from the noise and the talk of the great hall. He walked toward Hagrid's hut, though he had no real intention of going there.

It was a moment before he noticed that someone was trailing after him, doing his or her best not to make any noise. He whipped around, expecting a blond-haired, pointy-faced person named Draco, but was pleasantly surprised to see red-haired Ginny. She stopped when he turned, and smiled faintly.

"Sorry," said she. "I didn't mean to pry..."

She stumbled the last few steps toward him in the cold; her small nose was red and her cheeks were icy, but she looked beautiful in spite of it.

"No," said Harry. "It's fine. I was just...going to take a walk. Too much noise, you know..."

"Ah," she said, suppressing what was undoubtedly another smile. "Yeah."

"What are you smirking about?" Asked Harry scathingly, glaring slightly (however unintentionally).

She glared back.

"Well," said she. "I was feeling guilty about telling Fred and George until I found out what had happened between those two rabbits in my room."

Harry scowled.

"So what do you think, that they deserve to be yelled at in front of the entire school?" Harry snapped.

"NO," said Ginny, now sincerely regretting taking a walk with him. "But I do think they deserve to get pregnant, or at least get yelled at by mum. Serves them right."

Harry rolled his eyes. "Whatever."

Harry and Ginny tramped through the wet grass in angry silence. He didn't look in her direction and she stared straight into the closely falling darkness.

"I don't think they deserved it," said Harry.

"Oh please," said Ginny. "I don't know what their problem is. I've been with Dean for ages and we've never...well, we don't..." she trailed off, flustered. "Well, I'd never do anything like that!"

"Fun for Dean," said Harry bitterly.

"You know what I mean!" She shouted at him. "Anyone with half a brain knows when to back off!"

"Well," said Harry, who was torn between agreeing and standing up for his friends. "Maybe you don't know what it's like to really be attached to someone! Ron and Hermione love each other, no matter what people say! Maybe you've never really been in love!"

She stopped in her tracks, glaring at him. Her wand hand twitched somewhere close to her back pocket.

"Is that so," she said.

"Oh, come on, Ginny," Harry said. He said out loud a little more than he had meant to. "You know what Hermione and Ron have been like—I mean, ever since they met they've been constantly bickering with each other for stupid reasons, and then Krum came along and Ron was furious..."

She was still glaring at him, but she followed as he continued to walk, burying his chin in his scarf and his hands in his pockets. She stuffed her hands in her own angrily. They walked in silence again for several more moments.

"Oi!"

Harry and Ginny both stopped, turning. Dean was standing on the base of the hill, blocking the light streaming from several of the castle windows. It had grown dark very quickly and they both squinted, trying to make out Dean's face through the light.

"Ginny!" He called, giving Harry a dirty look. "You're missing dinner. Where've you been?"

She glanced at Harry.

"I was just taking a walk," she said. Her voice was teeming with annoyance. "I'm coming."

Harry watched her walk up the hill and continued towards the light of Hagrid's windows. He wasn't quite sure where he was going, but he walked anyway, even more annoyed now that Ginny was gone than he was when she had been arguing with him.

After walking alone for several minutes, he stopped, looked toward the glittering lights in the great hall, and ran towards the building.


	5. The Oddities of Girls

Harry met up with Ron and Hermione in the Great Hall where they were huddled together, whispering to each other scandalously. When Harry approached, they sprang apart and stuffed their mouths with food.

"What's going on?" asked Harry randomly, sitting down across from them and scanning the room.

Hermione and Ron glanced at each other quickly.

"Nothing," they both said shortly, but Ron's neck started to turn red.

"Oh," said Harry, choosing to ignore this. He scanned the table and spotted Ginny's angry glare from a little ways down, next to Dean. He chose to ignore this as well. Luna was the only one at their table who wasn't a Gryffindor. She spotted him and waved vaguely; Harry stared blankly and waved, turning slightly red as he spotted Snape out of the corner of his eye.

Luna then proceeded to search for Snape, smiling smartly to herself. Harry caught Snape's smirk and vomited a little in his mouth.

Hermione and Ron were back to whispering to each other; Hermione was giggling. Harry glared at them.

"Look, I know you're both very proud, but stuff like that is going to have to stop," said Harry, feeling grossed out in every possible way. Ron blushed again, but Hermione simply smirked.

"Thank you," he said as they began eating once more, though they didn't stop giving each other furtive looks and smiling to themselves proudly at random moments. Harry looked up again and Ginny was still glaring at him. He looked straight at her and rolled his eyes obviously, and she scowled.

"Mr. Weasley," said McGonagall suddenly.

The entire table jumped.

"Your mother would like to see you. Miss Granger, your parents are here."

Hermione gasped loudly and dropped her fork.

"NO!"

"Yes, Miss Granger, I'm afraid so," said Professor McGonagall sternly. "They are waiting for you in the hospital wing."

Both Ron and Hermione stood quickly and ran from the Great Hall, whispering to each other again (but in a frantic way). Harry rolled his eyes and let his fork drop onto his plate loudly. McGonagall, understanding the source of Harry's frustration as he watched the pair run down the room frantically, patted his shoulder sympathetically and continued after them.

"Harry," said a voice. He turned and saw Seamus, Neville, and Ginny, who also looked like they felt bad for him. "You can come over here and eat with us if you want," Seamus was saying.

"Er...no thanks," said Harry nervously. "I'm just going to go up to the dormitory." Without another word he got up from the table and left. He hated it when people felt sorry for him.

Instead of going to the dormitory like he said he would, he decided to walk a little. After passing the kitchens, the library, the dungeons, and what had been Dumbledore's office, he decided to find the Room of Requirement, where no one could find him (mostly because no one else knew where it was). He arrived in the corridor and walked, back and forth three times, thinking I need somewhere to sit alone, I need somewhere to think alone...

Harry opened his eyes and looked. There was no door.

"What?" He said aloud, not really meaning too.

"Harry?"

Harry looked down the corridor and spotted Neville, who was looking at him with an odd look on his face.

"Um, Harry...I think you should come back to the dormitory," said Neville. "Ginny and Luna are in there and they're going through Ron's stuff..."

"What?" said Harry again stupidly and took off down the hallway. He knew Ron and Hermione would never stand for something like that.

"Frange femur," said Harry to the fat lady and pushed through the door, not waiting for an answer.

"GINNY! LUNA!" shouted Harry as he stormed up the stairs, followed closely by Neville.

"Neville, you little git," said Ginny, stuffing a black shirt into her back pocket hastily. "I ought to hex you for that."

Luna was on Seamus' bed with a red and pink book in one hand with her other arm extended over her head. Her leg was up in the air as well; she had a confused look on her face. Harry caught the words Kuma Sutra on the side and blushed furiously, looking away as quick as he could.

"LUNA!" screeched Ginny. "Where did you get that?"

Luna didn't look up from the book. She kept reading and pointed with the hand that had been up in the air at Ron's trunk.

"It says it's from Hermione..." Luna trailed off.

"Yuck," said Ginny, scowling and throwing things off of Ron's bed. She sat on the very edge, looking sick.

"You shouldn't go looking through his stuff, Ginny, he's going to be furious," said Harry angrily. "So whatever you took, put it back."

"What are you talking about? I didn't take anything," she said loftily.

"I saw you! You stuck something of his in your back pocket!"

"Ginny? Luna?"

Ron had come around the corner; he looked confused.

"What are you two doing in here? HEY! LUNA! PUT THAT AWAY!"

"Dear Ickle Ronnikins," sang Luna. "May all your nights be very interesting. Love always, from your—"

Ron snatched it away from her, beet red.

"—Hermy-own," finished Luna, smiling vibrantly.

"WHAT ARE YOU TWO DOING IN MY STUFF!" shouted Ron, still red in the face.

"RON," said Hermione, walking through the door. "What could you possibly be yelli—Luna?"

She stared at Luna, who was still smirking.

"RON!" shrieked Hermione, recognizing the book. "WHY DO YOU HAVE THAT OUT!" She blushed nearly as red as Ron.

"I didn't get it out! They did!" Ron argued back, pointing at them. Harry crossed the room and laid down in his bed, ignoring them.

Hermione snatched the book out of Ron's hand and stuffed it in her back pocket. She glanced at Ron and Harry, then looked at Ginny.

"Um, Ginny, do you think we could talk to Luna alone for a second," she asked, a little too sweetly.

"Look, Hermione, it's no big deal, I was going through his stuff too," said Ginny, jumping off the bed. "It's not like we found anything we didn't already know was here."

"No, no, it wasn't about that. We just...wanted to talk to her about something."

Both Ginny and Luna looked at her skeptically.

"...About what?" asked Ginny in a voice that was almost as sickly sweet.

"Nothing!" said Hermione, blushing a little bit as she said it. Harry rolled his eyes. If she had just said something, he would have been able to get Ginny out of the room without turning red. Ginny, of course, didn't miss it.

"I want to know what's going on," said Ginny with a powerful force in her voice.

"Well...I don't know if Luna—"

"So, you found out then?"

Harry, Ron, and Hermione all looked at Luna with shock.

"Well...well..." Ron gulped. "We just wanted to know if..."

"Neville, get out," said Luna.

Neville glared at her, but he turned and walked out anyway.

"Harry," she said. "Close the door." Harry got up from his bed and did as he was told. Afterwards, he felt silly for doing what he was told.

"What..." Ginny looked at all of them. "What the bloody hell is going on?"

"Language, Ginny," said Ron.

She said something back to him that was very rude. Harry stared at her, a little surprised.

"So, I'm guessing that you want to know how it happened," asked Luna, looking around as if she didn't care what they were discussing.

"Well...yes," said Hermione.

"SERIOUSLY," spat Ginny. "What the bloody hell is going on?"

"Luna's having an affair with Snape," said Harry.

He looked rather surprised having said these words out loud. Ginny glanced at him skeptically. She transferred her glance to Hermione, who looked away, then to Ron, who was staring at the floor, and finally to Luna, who was positively beaming.

"WHAT?"

"It's true," said Luna, picking up Harry's copy of Which Broomstick from Harry's bed and reading quietly, quite unalarmed.

"Holy brand-new white wizard Gandalf, LUNA!" Ginny screeched. "THAT'S DISGUSTING!"

She sank down on the end of Ron's bed once more, shaking and looking pale.

"Luna," said Hermione quietly. "How...? When...? Why...? I mean, Snape...?"

Luna shrugged.

"I don't know, it just happened," she said, still reading.

"No, no," said Ginny. "Things like...getting lost, or...being tripped happen. Things like...affairs with Snape just don't happen!"

Luna gave her a calculating look.

"You cannot control the forces of love, Ginny."

"Luna—" started Harry, grossed out. Dean and Seamus, who walked through the door talking about Parvati Patil, interrupted Harry; they stopped when they saw Hermione, Ron, Luna, Harry, and Ginny, who was still sitting on the bed, looking sick to her stomach.

"Ginny?" asked Dean. "What's wrong?"

She got up from the bed and ran out the door, avoiding Dean.

"Ginny!" he called, but he didn't go after her. "What's going on?" he asked Harry. Harry stared and didn't say anything.

"Well," said Luna, smiling. "I'm going to bed. Well...maybe."

Ron turned purple.

Hermione followed her, glancing at Ron with a worried look on her face.

"What was that all about?" asked Seamus. Harry shrugged. Ron sat on his bed with his arms around his knees, rocking slightly and muttering to himself.

"Ron, it's going to be alright," said Harry, smiling in spite of himself. Ron pulled the curtains around the bed.

Without another look at Dean or Seamus, Harry climbed in his own bed and pulled the curtains around him.


	6. The Hogwarts-Azkaban Outreach Association

Harry woke the next morning after a very unpleasant dream of being chased by Luna, Snape, and Ginny Weasley (who had been attempting to beat him with his own broomstick).

Harry pulled himself up in his bed groggily and yawned. It was 8:30.

"RON!" Screamed Harry. "We're late for charms!"

Harry leapt out of his bed and pulled Ron's curtains aside.

"AHHHH!" he screamed, falling over backwards, shielding his eyes from the horrible sight, which lay before him.

"HARRY!" barked Ron, pulling his sheet over his bare chest and shoulders. Hermione sat up next to him, quite unabashed, wearing Ron's old, faded T-shirt.

"Harry," she said, sounding a bit like Mrs. Weasley. "What are you doing?"

"What do you two think you're doing!" Harry shouted at them. "Have you both lost your minds! You're both in enough trouble as it is without sneaking into each other's rooms! Besides," he said, gasping for air. "We're late for charms!"

"NO!" screeched Hermione. She looked like she was going to move, then thought better of it. "Harry, get out!"

"I'm still in my pajamas, what am I—"

"I'LL BE OUT IN JUST A SECOND, GO!"

Harry fumed as he left the room, kicking the door out of the way. He felt very much like kicking, hitting, or destroying something as he listened to them talk quietly to each other, laughing occasionally. Two weeks ago he didn't even know they were dating, and now they suddenly had an entire world between just the two of them.

"Thank you Harry," she said, followed closely Ron. He scowled at both of them and slammed the door.

Harry changed slowly; he was not really intending to show up to Charms at all. He'd had all of Ron and Hermione he could stand for a month. He searched for his Charms book slowly (although he always suspected it would be under his bed, and it was). He took a long time looking around for his shoes, which were buried beneath his Potions book and a pile of old shirts.

Finally, when it was time for Herbology, he started down the stairs toward the common room.

"No, no," said a female voice. "That's not what I heard. Seamus told me he was dating Parvati—or was it Padma? Oh, I can't remember—too."

"Well," said what sounded like Romilda Vane's voice. "I can't say it would surprise me in the least. He's not exactly the brightest boy around, is he?"

Harry stopped and listened.

"I don't know," said the other girl. "We don't exactly talk."

"How could you know Ginny and not know him too?" Asked Romilda.

Harry guessed that the other girl shrugged.

"I don't know," said Romilda doubtfully. "But Harry seems to like him, and if Harry—"

"Oh, come on," said the other girl. "You don't still like Harry, do you?"

"Shut up!" said Romilda, sounding hurt. "You're the one who had a crush on Dean. Like that would ever happen. Ginny'd have your insides for dinner."

The other girl retorted bitterly and he heard them both step through the portrait hole.

Harry tried his best not to think it, but the name was already creeping into his mind. Ron? No! Ron wouldn't! Ron's with Hermione!

He shook his head and walked out the door, resolving to talk to Ron first before he did anything else. That was, if he could get him away from Hermione.

Harry went to Herbology and ignored people's stares and furtive whispering. When class was over, he went to the Great Hall and found Ron and Hermione, who were talking to each other in a way that was not at all secretive. Instead, they seemed to be having a normal conversation, the sort they hadn't been able to have for what seemed like ages.

"Hi, Harry," said Ron as he sat down. "What happened to you in Charms?"

Harry shrugged. "Didn't feel up to it, I guess," he replied.

"WHAT A LOAD OF RUBBISH!"

Harry, Hermione, Ron, and a number of other people turned to look at Ginny, who was standing opposite Dean in the path of a lot of a crowd of Hufflepuffs, who were all watching rudely. Ginny was red in the face and was standing in a way reminiscent of Mrs. Weasley. She looked livid.

Dean, on the other hand, was wearing a blank expression. Harry decided to take this for fright.

"PARVATI?" she screeched. Harry winced. "PARVATI PATIL!"

Once again, Ginny's wand arm was twitching next to her back pocket. This time, she went for it.

"RICTUSEMPRA!" she shouted. McGonagall leapt to her feet, shouting something. Dean flew backward and hit Seamus; they both fell to the ground with a crash.

"HEY!" shouted Parvati, but she sank back as Ginny turned on her, eyes wide and terrifying. It wasn't like Ginny at all.

"Ginny, NO!" shouted Harry. Ron sprang forward and pulled her back. Snape and McGonagall were both sprinting over towards the scene, where Neville was helping Dean up and Ron and Harry were both restraining Ginny, who was nearly foaming at the mouth.

McGonagall was livid.

"GINNY WEASLEY!" she barked. "I expected better than that out of you!"

Ginny was now glaring at McGonagall, but it was almost as if she didn't know she was there.

"Longbottom, Finnigan," said Snape curtly. "Take Mr. Thomas to the hospital wing immediately. Potter, Weasley, take this one to my office and stay there."

Harry and Ron looked at each other. Ginny had kind of collapsed in their arms; she was shaking and looking from side to side, as if she didn't quite remember what had happened.

Harry and Ron did as they were told and walked down the corridor with Ginny propped up between them. She wasn't saying anything. She only stared, dazed.

"Mr. Potter," said McGonagall from behind them. "I think it would be best if you took Ginny to the hospital wing."

"But—" said Harry. "Snape told us to—"

"I am well aware what Professor Snape told you, Mr. Potter. Now do what I told you to do," she snapped, and started walking away from them briskly toward the hospital wing.

Ginny drooped on Harry's shoulder. She was looking at Professor McGonagall. Since they'd never really paid attention to Snape's orders anyway, they followed after her.

When they entered the hospital wing, a big curtain was set up that Madam Pomfrey came bustling through.

"Oh," the woman said. "Here's the one who—"

"Mr. Weasley, I told you to take the girl up to my office," spat Snape, looking angry.

"I told them to come," said Professor McGonagall. "I feel it is best to have Miss Weasley looked over."

Harry and Ron helped Ginny onto the nearest bed. She lay down; her eyes were still wide and terrified and she looked sick.

"You're not really under the authority to disregard my orders," said Snape, sneering. McGonagall glared at him.

"Are you going to fire me, Severus?" Asked McGonagall. "Poppy, can you please take a look at Miss Weasley?"

Madam Pomfrey looked at the girl disapprovingly, but checked her over anyway.

McGonagall shot Harry a dirty look.

"You two may go."

Ron opened his mouth to protest.

"NOW, Mr. Weasley," she barked.

Both Harry and Ron turned to leave, rolling their eyes. When they appeared on the other side of the door, Neville was there, staring blankly at them.

"What are you doing here?" Asked Ron accusingly. Neville blinked, and said nothing. Harry and Ron continued to walk.

"What do you think that was all about?" asked Ron, frowning. Harry had an idea, but he didn't want to say anything.

"Dean was cheating on Ginny with Parvati," said Neville, racing after them.

Ron stopped and glared at Neville. "WHAT?"

"Well...Icicle—"

"What?" asked Harry.

"Icicle," said Neville. "Draco's new girlfriend from Hufflepuff. Anyway, Parvati told Icicle and Icicle told Draco, who told Pansy who asked Lavender who didn't know who asked Justin Finch-Fletchley who had walked in on them snogging earlier that day. Justin told Hannah Abbott, who told Susan Bones, who told Colin and Dennis Creevey who went and blabbed to Madam Hooch. She told McGonagall of course and McGonagall told Percy, who sent a letter to Fred. George told Mrs. Weasley and she sent Mr. Weasley an owl and he told Tom, from the Leaky Cauldron. When Tom saw Hagrid he told him and Hagrid told Madam Rosmerta who told Lucius Malfoy, who told me."

Ron blinked.

"Why were you talking to Lucius Malfoy?" asked Harry, confused.

"Oh," said Neville. "The Hogwarts-Azkaban Outreach Association," he explained. "We write letters to lonely Azkaban prisoners begging them to change their ways."

Ron blinked again.

"You're pen-pals with Lucius Malfoy?" Asked Ron, giving him a dirty look.

"How long has this been going on?" asked Harry.

Neville shrugged. "No one knows for sure. Lucius only found out three days ago from Rodolphus."

"How did Rodol—" Harry stopped, deciding not to ask.

Ron looked angry suddenly.

"Dean Thomas was cheating on my sister!" He demanded. He turned sharply, but Harry caught him.

"Ron, don't," said Harry. "That's just going to make Ginny more upset."

They walked back to the common room while Ron harped about Dean and how dead he was going to be as soon as Madam Pomfrey let him out of the hospital wing. When they arrived back in the common room, everyone was still sitting up talking about Ginny Weasley and Hermione ran into Ron's arms like he was some sort of horrible, tragic hero.

Harry, Ron, and Hermione were the only ones who sat up, waiting for Ginny to return. They understood that she had done something pretty wrong, but it wasn't any worse than anything anyone else had done before. After all, she could have used an unforgivable curse, but she settled for one of the nice, legal ones.

It wasn't until close to four in the morning when McGonagall suddenly appeared, creaking through the door of the portrait hole loudly. They were all suddenly wrenched out of their sleep.

McGonagall motioned for all of them to follow her, and they stepped out after her, all tired and very suddenly confused.


	7. The Mary Card

Ron, Harry, and Hermione all followed after McGonagall quietly. Harry was very tempted to ask McGonagall what her purpose of dragging them out of the common room at 4:30 in the morning happened to be this time, but he didn't say anything. Ron and Hermione were holding hands and whispering to each other for the thirty-seventh time in the past two days, but Harry ignored this.

He thought maybe they would be forced into Snape's office for a long session of verbal abuse, but McGonagall walked straight past it without stopping.

When they entered the Hospital Wing, Harry jumped when he saw Mr. Weasley, Fred, and Percy. It was Percy who they were extremely surprised to see standing angrily next to Fred, because he hadn't been on speaking terms with the rest of the family since before last year. They all looked worried and were staring at Ginny, who was sitting on top of the bed.

Dean Thomas and Seamus were gone, but Ginny was very pale, and avoiding everyone's glances. Her eyes were bloodshot, like she had been crying.

"Dad?" asked Ron. "What are you doing here? Fred? Percy?"

"Harry, Hermione," said Professor McGonagall. "If you would please stand out in the hallway for a moment, we'll explain in a moment."

"No!" shouted Ginny suddenly, shooting Ron an anxious look. "I want Hermione to be here!"

Harry scowled.

"Never mind," said Harry slowly. "I'll go."

Harry walked through the door and heard it snap shut behind him. He stood outside and leaned up against the wall, being as silent as possible, hoping to hear something. No one made any noise, or, perhaps the room was just protected by some kind of silencing magic. In any event, he heard nothing of importance.

He stood in the hallway for what seemed like hours. The only thing he had to entertain him was the occasional moving of shadows underneath the door to the infirmary. Every once in a while, someone would move and Harry would jump up, but no one came to claim him for a long time.

The portraits on the wall made fun of his pajama pants.

Inside the room, Ginny's jaw was shaking as she vied for the courage to say what she needed to say to Ron.

"Ron," she said. "I'm, er…pregnant."

Ron's mouth fell open and he stared, wordlessly, at his younger sister. Hermione stared too, just as blankly, also at a loss for words.

Hermione, who assumed that she was only in the room to restrain Ron, stood awkwardly. She didn't really know what to say. After all, the only thing she could think to say was:

"Well, um…congratulations, Ginny."

Ginny shook her head furiously. Hermione opened her mouth to say something, but closed it.

"Dad," asked Ron. "Where's mom?"

At the mention of their mother, Ginny scowled and glared at Ron.

"She is…out of the room at the moment," said Percy. "She didn't feel well."

Ginny scoffed. They looked at her, but she looked away out the window, still scowling.

"Ginny," said Mr. Weasley. "Maybe you should talk to your mum. If you just try to reason with her, I'm sure she'll come to her senses."

"Yes, RIGHT," screeched Ginny. "Because that's really what she wants to right now. If she won't even believe me—"

"You have to admit, Gins, it sounds a little crazy. If you would just tell us the truth—"

"I HAVE TOLD YOU THE TRUTH!" She screamed at them, eyes flashing madly. Hermione steered Ron to a chair because he looked close to falling over, and walked back toward Ginny, trying to keep her on the bed. The small red-head was glaring at her father, once again close to tears.

"Wha—" Hermione started.

"They don't believe me!" demanded Ginny, pointing her hands at the different Weasley's in the room and Professor McGonagall, who was watching her with great concern. "I told them and they don't believe me and I am NOT MAKING IT UP!"

Hermione stared blankly.

"What?"

McGonagall cleared her throat nervously.

"Miss Weasley has claimed—is claiming that—that the—that she is—that the baby does not have a father."

Hermione raised her eyebrow and glanced skeptically at Ginny momentarily, hoping that someone was joking. She glanced at Ron, who was staring doubtfully at McGonagall, with his mouth still hanging open.

"Ginny," said Madam Pomfrey, who was standing in the corner. "It's very common for young girls to react this way. There's no need to feel guilty or anything, alright. It happens often, and you have nothing to be ashamed of."

"I'm not ashamed of anything! I didn't do anything! Me and Dean, we never—"

"What?" Ron said finally, staring at Ginny.

Ginny automatically seethed, turning on Ron.

"FINE," she barked. "DON'T BELIEVE ME! NOBODY EVER BELIEVES ME—"

"Ginny, I never said I doubted you, alright!" shouted Ron uneasily.

"Ginny," said Hermione soothingly. "It's going to be ok, alright? No one's going to think the less of you—"

"How would you know," Ginny spat. "You're the slut who got pregnant with this idiot's rat of a baby!"

Percy, Mr. Weasley, McGonagall, and Fred's jaws all dropped.

"Ginny," gasped Ron.

Hermione only stood for a second, staring at her. Ginny glared at her and Hermione turned away rigidly. She walked straight out of the room and slammed the door.

Hermione appeared on the other side of the room and gave Harry a dark look.

"What's going on?" asked Harry, scared by the look on Hermione's angry face more than anything else.

The only thing Hermione did was shrug, and she continued down the hallway.

Harry tried to walk through the doorway, but Ginny and Ron suddenly appeared soon after Hermione's departure and were about to run right into him.

"That was completely uncalled for!" shouted Ron.

"GO AWAY," she screamed, and Ron flew backwards across the floor and hit his head on the wooden door.

Harry helped him up and Ron rubbed his head.

"EVERY DAY!" Ron shouted at him. "EVERYONE HATES ME SUDDENLY AND I DON'T KNOW WHY!"

"I don't hate you, Ron," said Harry, slapping him on the shoulder. Then, whispering, he said: "What went on in there?"

Ron shook his head and moved on down the hallway, muttering to himself.

"I can't, Harry…I've got to find Hermione," he said, running slowly.

Harry scowled and walked down the hallway back toward the common room. When he entered the boy's dormitory, Harry noticed that Ron and Hermione and Neville were all there, but Seamus and Dean were gone. Hermione and Ron were sitting next to each other on his bed, and Neville was watching from his own.

"I can't believe she would say something like that to us!" Hermione was screaming through sobs. Ron was rubbing her shoulders.

"I know," he said blankly.

"Considering what she's telling everyone!"

Harry stopped in front of them.

"Does somebody feel like telling me what's going on?" asked Harry sourly. Hermione and Ron's secret world was enough for one week.

Ron and Hermione looked at each other sternly.

"Ginny's pregnant and she's gone completely insane!" barked Hermione.

Harry blinked. His jaw dropped and he stared, scandalized.

"And!" she screeched. "And she's telling everyone that there isn't a father!"

Harry wasn't exactly sure he heard this at first. He had the sudden overwhelming desire to hunt down and murder Dean Thomas. It was very fortunate he happened to be out of the room, which, actually, was probably no coincidence at all.

"Wait…no father?"

"Yeah," she replied, nodding furiously. "She's pulling a virgin Mary card and claiming that she just miraculously got bumped!"

"Hey," said Ron. "Watch it!"

She shot him a very terrifying look.

"DON'T STAND UP FOR HER RON! HOW COULD YOU STILL BE STANDING UP FOR HER AFTER WHAT SHE SAID ABOUT US AND OUR BABY!"

"Whoa, whoa," said Harry. "What'd she say?"

Ron glanced nervously at Hermione, who looked manic.

"She said that, uh…that Hermione was—"

"A SLUT!" Hermione screeched. "AND THAT OUR BABY WAS A RAT AND THAT HE'S AN IDIOT!" she finished, pointing one shaking finger at Ron.

Harry gaped.

"No, she wouldn't…"

"Well, she did," Hermione snapped.

Neville coughed nervously. Undoubtedly, he hadn't expected to hear about another pregnancy.

"No word of this goes out to Lucius Malfoy, Neville," said Ron, suddenly noticing him.

Neville frowned.

"Well…" Harry started cautiously. "I'm sure she'll apologize, Hermione. I mean, she just found out she was pregnant. Don't you remember how upset you were when you found out? Crying all over the place and everything…"

"I didn't call my best friend a slut!" she barked. "I remember that much!"

Hermione and Ron sat on his bed while Harry changed behind the curtains of his. Hermione shot him an angry glare as he left the room for breakfast, and he ignored it.

In the Great Hall, Harry was nervously eavesdropping on nearby conversations to see if anyone knew anything about Ginny. It was his intention to keep Ginny's news as quiet as possible for as long as possible; however, as Dumbledore had said a long time ago in his first year, any secret meant to be kept by the staff was normally known by every student in less than a few days.

"Harry!" someone called. Harry jumped. It was Luna.

"Oh," he said, spotting her. "Hi Luna."

She sat down next to him.

"What happened to Ginny?"

Harry dropped his fork.

"What?" he demanded. "How do you know anything!"

She smiled knowingly.

"Severus told me."

Harry's insides turned inside out at the sound of Luna calling Snape by his first name. He cringed, and said nothing, only shaking his head. After all, he wanted to keep it as quiet as possible and that meant not talking about it in the most crowded room in the building.

"Harry," she said sternly.

"Look, I'll tell you later. I don't want to say anything in here, where we're always being listened to and everything."

She nodded and stood up, however unwillingly.

In the corner, Harry spotted Dean Thomas, who was standing with his arm around Parvati Patil. He was whispering something furiously to Seamus Finnigan, who was laughing. Also standing nearby, oddly, was Draco. Harry glared at him.

Draco, he noticed, no longer had white, blinding hair (or even purple hair, the color he had attempted to change it a few days before). Instead, it was black, and he had a small, thin girl with pale skin and shadowy, dark eyes hanging onto his shoulder.

Harry automatically sensed the trouble in this. Draco hated Gryffindors, even ones like Dean and Seamus, who he never really talked to.

Ron and Hermione strolled into the Great Hall. They both looked mad, but Ron, at least, had calmed down a lot. Hermione was still glaring at anything that stepped into her path.

"Hi Harry," said Ron, sitting down next to him. Hermione sat on the other side of Ron and didn't look at Harry, but he assumed that she was still angry with him.

When they were finished with breakfast, they all got up and went outside for a bit before their classes started. Ron glared at Dean when he saw him, still standing next to the dark-haired Draco. Luna followed them outside and leaned up against the tree nonchalantly, obviously waiting for Hermione and Ron to leave. Harry glared at her.

"Dean's talking to Draco?" Hermione said stiffly. "Since when does that happen?"

Harry wasn't entirely sure how much Dean knew about the night before. Someone, at least, might have asked him about it.

Lavender Brown crossed the courtyard and walked up to where Dean, Seamus, Parvati, Draco, and Icicle were all standing underneath a tree. Harry stared at the back of Dean's head while Hermione and Ron grumbled to each other.

"I knew it," Harry heard Lavender say. "She was acting so weird yesterday…"

"I know," said Dean, shrugging conceitedly. "But it's not my fault, if you know what I mean."

Harry twitched nervously. Ron and Hermione weren't paying attention…

"What?" gawked Lavender. "But I thought—"

"No," said Dean, as if the idea was ridiculous. "She's a prude. Either that or she's a tease."

Harry's fists clenched. Ron looked up and stared at the back of Dean's head, as if he could sense what was coming.

Parvati scoffed. "Right."

"Well, yeah, I guess not," he said, and they all laughed meanly. "I mean, she's there for somebody, isn't she? I didn't know she was such a slut."

Ron stood up so violently that Hermione was pushed backwards.

"Ouch!" she yelled loudly. Dean, Parvati, and Lavender heard and they turned.

"DEAN!" screamed Luna. "RUN!"

Ron shoved Harry out of the way and he flew, face first, onto the ground. Dean saw the look on Ron's face took off running; obviously, he hadn't realized that Ron was there.

Ron, on the other hand, was busy chasing after him. They were both running faster than Harry had ever seen anyone run.

Luna disappeared through the door and Harry clambered back to his feet.

Harry raced after the both of them, screaming "RON! NO! DON'T!"

As much as he longed to beat up Dean himself, it wasn't worth being expelled.

Hermione was pulling herself off the ground, searching for her wand in her pockets. When she found it, she started running after them.

Ginny and Luna burst through the doors, gasping for breath, spotted Harry, Ron, and Dean's disappearing dots and began running again. Ginny screamed as she ran, "RON YOU IDIOT! STOP!"

Luna was clutching her side, red in the face.

A few scared first years jumped out of the way. Hermione, when she was close enough, tried to lift her wand, but it was too much to ask for a good shot. Finally, she gave up on her wand at all and screamed "IMPEDIMENTA!" louder and stronger than Harry'd ever heard before. Not only did Ron stop running in mid-air, several of the scared first years, an older Ravenclaw, Harry, Ginny, Luna, and Dean all fell on the ground with angry crashes.

Hermione was the only one still able to move.

"Sorry about that Harry," she said, stepping over him loftily. "I only meant to stop Ron, but you know how these things work sometimes..."

Ginny couldn't move, but her eyes were angry.

Hermione lifted Ron off of the ground and slapped him.

"RON, YOU IDIOT! DO YOU WANT TO BE EXPELLED?"

She let him fall back onto the ground with a loud thump.

Hermione unfroze all of them except for Ron, who Luna, Harry, and Ginny all helped carry back to the common room. When they were a safe enough distance away from Dean, Hermione unfroze him and they had a huge argument in the common room that ended with them snogging in the corner.

Harry watched Ginny retreat out of the room to go to class, ready to face the rumors and gossip of her classmates on her own terms.


	8. The Snitch

Harry walked into Charms by himself and was startled to see Lupin standing at the front of the room, looking gloomy and annoyed. Professor Flitwick was nowhere to be found and some of the kids (who knew he was a werewolf) were staring at him warily.  
Harry looked around and noticed a bunch of diagrams hanging on the walls. He stood for a moment staring at one, and, when he finally realized what it was, turned beet red and walked quickly to his seat.

Ron and Hermione were already there, wearing identical smirks. Harry sat down next to them and shook his head, rolling his eyes at their faces.

"This is your fault, you know," Harry laughed nervously. They started to giggle. "If you two could gain some self-control…"

Lupin smiled weakly at Harry from the front of the room.

"Good morning class," said Lupin. He looked very tired. "In light of recent…developments"—he glanced at Ron and Hermione as he said this—"your headmaster has decided it would be prudent that you are given a course in copulation discipline."

The class stared blankly. Ron blinked.

"Sex Ed.?" asked Ron. Hermione snorted and tried to choke back her laughter. Some of the students laughed, others just stared and got red in the face.

Harry shook his head again.

"Precisely," said Lupin. "Although…I can't imagine why most of you would need it."

The students laughed again, shooting looks at Ron and Hermione, who glared back at them.

"Anyway," started Lupin, and he went right into a discussion about how and why certain things happen.

Halfway through the class, Lavender Brown asked about different methods of magical birth control and Hermione rolled her eyes. Lavender caught it, and they got into a brief argument that ended in Ron shouting "Neither of you is any better than the other!"

Hermione shot him a nasty look that Harry knew would develop into a huge argument later (which would mostly end up with them kissing grossly for everyone to see).

Draco Malfoy was sitting in the back with his arm over his gloomy looking girlfriend, Icicle. Pansy, he noticed, sat on the other side of the room and glared at him with red eyes. When Hermione and Lavender started arguing, he started to laugh and Harry shot him a nasty look that he returned with relish.

Lupin stopped several potential fist fights between Hermione, a number of other girls, and even Neville, who had the cheek to ask the couple if they even knew where to find magical birth control. Ron gave him a look that would have shriveled trees and Neville simply looked away. Hermione told him to go write a note to his Death Eater pen-pals and Neville shot a nervous look at Lupin, who was now a well-known and honored member of Dumbledore's prestigious Order of the Phoenix.

Class went fairly uneven until the end when Lupin finally decided to let them go; Harry, Ron, Hermione, and the rest of their classmates acted like nothing had happened at all in the room and that no one had ever been arguing with anyone else mere seconds before.

As they walked through the hallway, Harry marveled at Hermione's ability to completely ignore the pointing and whispering. Some of the students were still pointing at him, obviously convinced of his guilt. Ron shot everyone smug, proud looks and they laughed at his nonchalant nature. They finished their classes and sat for a bit in the library until Hermione finally remembered that she and Ron were late for an appointment with Madam Pomfrey and they went their own ways.

Harry was asleep in one of the common room's chairs until a small blonde second year tapped him on the shoulder nervously muttering "Mr. Potter?" and shoved a note into his hand, darting away with a furious blush on her face.

_Potter:_

_The Minister of Magic would like a word._

_-Professor Snape_

Harry was walking through the hallway toward Snape's office when he suddenly spotted Mr. Weasley, who was looking down the hallway nervously tapping his feet.

"Harry!" called Mr. Weasley gratefully when he spotted him. He grabbed Harry's shirt and pulled him over toward him.

Mr. Weasley inspected him quietly.

"Harry, I was wondering if you could do me a favor."

Harry nodded. "Ok…"

"Well, Harry, here's the thing. Ginny won't let Madam Pomfrey look at her until everyone believes that she's telling the truth. And…technically, I'm not really allowed to go into any of the Common Rooms, being a ministry official and all that. I was wondering if you could maybe talk to Ginny for me," he said slowly. "You know…calm her down a little bit. Ask her about the…the…"

"Pregnancy?"

"Yes! Yes, of course."

Harry stared at him.

"Erm—Mr. Weasley—why me? Why don't you ask Ron, or….Hermione or something?"

Mr. Weasley coughed impatiently.

"Well…I guess that would be because Ginny's not too happy with Hermione at the moment, and…vice versa. And Ron? Well…bless him, but he doesn't have much tact. But you, well…because I thought you, given your past history, might, um, have a different insight for her. The miracle of life, and all that good stuff…plus, well, the authors want us to keep things moving. Do you understand what I'm saying?"

Harry stared.

"What auth—"

"Thank you, Harry! That'd be brilliant!"

Without another word, Mr. Weasley disappeared around the corner and vanished.

Harry was left speechless.

He made his way back to the common room and stood at the bottom of the stairs leading to the girl's dormitories, calling Ginny's name and asking random girls to go up and find her, if possible. One girl's face lit up when Harry approached her, and became gloomy when she heard that all he wanted was Ginny.

Finally, after thirty minutes, Luna Lovegood broke into the common room again and went up and actually found her. Her hair was very messy in the back, Harry noticed.

Ginny came down the stairs holding a large green book. Harry looked at the cover closely and noticed a very old man with a long grey beard and a small dark haired boy.

"Ginny?" asked Harry.

"Yeah?" she asked lazily.

"Could you put down the book for a minute?"

She snapped the book shut and glared at him, annoyed.

"What?"

"Well, can I talk to you a bit?"

She walked over to the chair and sat down, balancing the book on her knees. She was still looking at him accusingly, as if she knew exactly what this was about.

"Where's my dad?" asked Ginny, scowling at him.

"He's not allowed to come into the common room," said Harry nervously.

"Ah," said Ginny. She kept glaring at him.

"Well, I mean, you won't talk to anyone or anything, and you keep hiding in your dormitory reading and you won't talk to Hermione or Ron, so…everyone's…worried."

She kept glaring.

"Look, Ginny," said Harry, sitting across from her. "Why don't you just let Madam Pomfrey take a look at you—the baby—you and the baby. You know, it's for the best."

She narrowed her eyes.

"I don't have to do anything," she fumed.

"No! I mean, I know! But, it's better for the baby and what if something was to happen—"

"Why are you here, Harry? What'd you want? What'd you get out of all this?"

He paused.

"Nothing. It's just…your father—"

"I don't care what my father wants!" She picked up the book and slammed it on the floor. She was still glaring at him and her eyes were starting to get red.

A group of nearby fourth years were watching her.

"Ginny, fine, whatever, it's ok," he said, hoping that she wouldn't cry. He hated it when girls started crying.

"Nobody believes me!" she said, hissing softly at him. She was aware that the small group was watching her. "I haven't been this messed up since Riddle and now look what's happening! Hermione's all mad at me for no reason and Ron's ignore—"

"Hey! What about all that stuff you said to them in the hospital wing! You can't just expect her to get over something like that overnight!"

She shook her head and picked up the book. "Yeah, well, whatever! I'm going now!" and she stormed up the stairs.

The fourth years were still watching.

"WHAT!" shouted Harry.

Harry was on his way back to the great hall when he caught up with Hermione and Ron, who were walking with Luna.

"Hiya Harry," said Ron. "What's the matter?"

"Nothing," he said, ignoring their questioning looks. They walked through the doors and immediately kids everywhere started to look at Harry and point, talking amongst themselves.

"What the bloody hell is going on in here?" asked Ron, staring at everyone as they found their seats. A girl from Ravenclaw with black, curly hair came up to Luna and tugged on her sleeve. She whispered something in Luna's ear and Luna shot up, shaking her head furiously.

"Harry!" she shouted, grabbing his shirt and pulling him up away from the table, where no one could hear them. "Some of the Gryffindors overheard something in the Gryffindor common room about you and Ginn—"

"WHAT!" shouted Ron, whirling around and glaring at Harry accusingly. A short girl with brown hair was standing behind him, looking smug. "YOU DID WHAT WITH MY SISTER!"

"Ronald, don't be such a prat, of course he di—RON!"

Ron was hurling toward Harry. Harry pulled out his wand at the same time Hermione and Luna and Hannah Abbot did. They all yelled a different spell, which had interesting affects.

Harry wasn't surprised to see Ron lifted into the air, because he had thought levicorpus! when he saw Ron come toward him. Hermione went for the traditional Impedimenta, which kept him still despite the fact that he was hanging upside down, and Hannah Abbot went for some charm that wrapped ropes around his still arms and legs. Luna wasn't trying to stop Ron; she just wanted to summon a chair.

"RON," shouted Hermione angrily. "How many times a day do I have to stop you from killing someone!"

Ron didn't move. He couldn't.

Hermione took her spell away and Harry let Ron fall to the floor, suddenly uncaring. Hermione untied the ropes on his legs and lead him out of the room by his bound arms while they shouted at each other.

Harry rolled his eyes and was glad to see both of them go. Hermione wasn't quite as crazy, but she'd still only end up kissing Ron in the common room.

Luna and Harry sat down and ate with the Gryffindors. The brown-haired girl who'd been spreading the rumors about him was nowhere to be seen.

About thirty minutes later, Ginny stormed into the Great Hall.

"Harry," she snapped. "I need to speak with you."

Harry got up from the table reluctantly and followed her outside.

"HOW COULD YOU SAY SOMETHING LIKE THAT!" she screamed at him.

"I didn't say anything! This girl was—"

"I have enough going on without you spreading rumors about me and making Ron more angry—"

"Are you crazy? Do you think I want Ron to be mad at me all the time!"

She shoved him and he fell, caught off-guard. Ginny stomped off.

Harry got to his feet and brushed himself off. He was muttering to himself when he heard footsteps. He turned and jumped. It was Cho Chang.

She walked straight toward him and shoved him with all her might. He fell again.

"Whore!" she screamed, and walked into the building.


	9. The Elves of Slytherin and Gryffindor

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> changing some minor character names as when it was written, the person who i wrote this with were unashamedly inserting our friends into the story, we also inserted ourselves into the story because, you know, why not?

Harry woke up on Saturday grateful for a day off. He slid through the curtains groggily only to see Ron standing in the corner, pulling on his pants.

"Where are you going?" He asked.

Ron shot him an angry look.

"We have to go see Hermione's parents," he said and went silent. He appeared to be thinking about something very hard. Then, turning red, he said:

"Look…er, there's something Hermione and I forg—didn't tell you the other day…we didn't really know if we were actually going to…"

"YOU'RE GETTING MARRIED?" Harry screamed.

"Wha—! Hey—! DON'T USE LEGILIMENS ON ME!"

"I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU DIDN'T TELL ME BEFORE NOW!"

"Well…! We didn't really know if we were actually going to…and then her parents and my parents were all like 'get married' and we didn't know if we could, or if we were old enough…"

He said all this while he took off his shirt and replaced it in a very halfhearted way. Harry glared at him.

"I'm sorry—when is this happening? Surely not today—"

"NO!" shouted Ron. "I mean, it will eventually, but I'm…she's…we're not—"

"Ah," said Harry, understanding. "I see. Do you…want to?"

"Well…yeah!" said Ron. "I just thought that if we did we'd wait for a while. A long while…like…years. But now this has happened—"

"It's a baby Ron, not a 'this'."

"Yeah, thanks, I got it," he snapped at Harry. "Nevermind, I have to get out of here…"

Ron walked through the door and disappeared. Harry rolled his eyes, wondering if there would ever been an opportunity for him to have his friends back. Now the only people he had were Neville, Luna, and Ginny, all of which he didn't really want to talk to.

"Howdy Harry," said some random girl that Harry didn't recognize. She was walking past the door, followed by someone who looked strangely familiar…

"HEY!"

He darted out the door and chased after the two girls.

"HEY! YOU! STOP!"

The two girls stopped and looked at him.

The first girl was one he'd never remembered seeing, but both looked his age. The first was sort of pale, had long curly brown hair and dark plastic glasses. The second was a tad taller; she had short brown hair, brown eyes and a long nose a little like Ron's.

"You're the one who told—"

"I never said anythin' to anyone," said the brown-eyed girl, shaking her head. She had a weird accent that Harry couldn't quite place.

"Yeah you did! You're the one who told Ron I was—was—with Ginny—which I wasn't!"

She looked at him doubtfully.

"I can't believe you told people that!" shouted the curly-haired one, throwing an angry glare at the other. She had the same accent.

"You never said it was a secret!" said the second reproachfully.

Finally, Harry placed it.

"Where are you two from?" he asked, though he thought he knew the answer.

The one with the glasses looked at him.

"America," she said shortly. "Well, Texas…more specifically. We're transfer students."

He looked back and forth between the two of them, unsure.

"Can you do tha—"

"Oh yeah," said the second. "People do it all the time."

"Except, not lately," said the first.

They stared at him silently, narrowing their eyes as they inspected him. He didn't like the staring.

"I'm Rebekah," said the first sort of haughtily. "I'm in my seventh year. This is my cousin, Alex. She's in her sixth year like you, only she's in Slytherin."

He gave Alex a suspicious look.

"What are you doing in here?" he asked, unable to contain his loathing for Slytherins.

She shrugged.

"A little of this, a little of that," she said mysteriously. "On the look out for new gossip, as always."

"Yeah, well I'd appreciate it if you would keep quiet every once in a while," he spat at her. "You shouldn't be in other house's common rooms."

"Why not?" asked Rebekah. "That Luna Lovegood is in here all the time…among other places."

"Yeah, well Luna's—what?"

She smiled devilishly and said nothing else.

"Well, I better get going," said Alex. "Apparently Ernie McMillan is making a fuss in the Hufflepuff common room."

Without another word, she disapparated with a loud crack. Harry jumped about a mile.

"How'd she—you can't—Hogwarts, A History said—"

"Oh," said Rebekah. "Right."

"Well how'd she—"

"We're elves. Well…partly so. My great-great-great grandmother was a house elf and got married to the wizard she worked for, which had…interesting side-effects for the children."

"Married a…house elf? Can you do that?"

"Oh, yeah! In America you can do almost anything. Anyway, so…we can apparate whenever we want to and the ministry only thinks it's the other elves. We can also use bits of magic that the ministry doesn't pick up on, and are really good at wand-less magic."

"Oh…well, that's…that's..."

"Really weird? We know."

"But, why would someone want to marry a house elf?"

"Why would someone want to marry a giantess," she asked pointedly. "Talk about black holes of doom. Besides—you can't control the forces of love, Harry."

He wished people would stop telling him that and Rebekah walked away up the girl's stairs.

He thought this over for a minute and went back upstairs to change, shaking his head.

"Hiya Harry," said Neville, passing by the room. Harry followed him down the stairs and went to breakfast before he had to hurry off to Quidditch.

He made it to the Quidditch pitch where Katie Bell was standing in front of Ginny, looking angry. Ginny was glaring at her.

"I'm sorry, Ginny, but there's no way in hell McGonagall would ever let you play—"

Ginny took off toward the building and didn't look at him as he passed.

"Holy mother of Sauron, Harry," said Katie. "I think I might just kill the Weasleys."

Harry chuckled in spite of himself.

"What's the matter with them?" she asked as they walked toward the changing room together. "They've got extra fertile magical blood. And it makes them all mad—HEY! WATCH IT!"

The Gryffindor Harry met earlier that day was sitting on her broom, hovering a little over them.

"Keep your shirt on, Katie, I've got everything under control," she said.

"Tell her to keep her hands off of the quaffles!" Katie yelled at Rebekah, pointing one angry finger at Alex.

The Slytherin was sitting on her broom a little while away, smiling at Harry and waving. He thought for a moment about not waving back, and then did anyway. Rebekah and Alex took off down the Quidditch pitch, throwing the quaffle back and forth to each other. Rebekah threw the quaffle toward the goal and made it in spite of Alex's efforts; the Gryffindors who had started crowding around started to cheer while the Slytherins scowled.

"That's not nice," said Alex as they both landed on the ground. "I'm a beater."

"Yeah, well your chasing skills need a little work," said Rebekah.

"Why don't you try a little beating, and see how that works out! No one ever told you that you could hit a wicked bludger!" spat Alex.

"I don't have to hit anything," sneered Rebekah. "All I have to do is be faster than you…and I am."

She followed Harry and Katie into the changing rooms while Alex stood on the pitch, fuming; Harry asked her again why she and the Slytherin were friends.

"Well, she's normally pretty tame," explained Rebekah. "But she gets kind of angry before Quidditch games. I think it's the beater in her."

Harry changed quickly and went out to the pitch where he and Katie talked to the new stand-in keeper, Seamus Finnigan, who would be playing in the game since Ron had to leave for the weekend. Katie scolded the new beaters, Allison and Marissa, who were third-years, and a good deal younger than most members of the team. They'd been trying to hit each other with the bludgers until Katie had started screaming at them.

The permanent chasers had been Ginny, Rebekah, and Katie, but Ginny had to be replaced with Romilda Vane. She looked less than excited to be there, although she did, much to Harry's disliking, cheer up a bit when she saw him come out onto the pitch.

Harry took a moment to inspect the new Slytherin members.

The new beater, Alex, could hit surprisingly hard; she'd already given Crabbe a black eye for annoying her. They had a new chaser, a boy Harry'd never seen before, but he wasn't too worried because the boy looked a little slow in the head. Draco, as always, had returned as a seeker, and was standing on the ground with an arm around his thin girlfriend; she was decked out in Hufflepuff wear, but she had a Slytherin-green scarf around her neck.

"Odd looking girl, isn't she?" asked Katie, looking at them. "And what'd Draco do to his hair?"

"Those robes make you look retarded," said Rebekah to Alex. Alex grabbed her beater's bat and hurled one of the struggling bludgers in her direction; Harry was very glad to see that Rebekah was as fast as she had boasted, because she shot out of the way and sped off as the bludger chased her around the pitch. She appeared to be enjoying herself and didn't stop until McGonagall stormed onto the field screaming and telling people to stop messing around.

"Captains!" shouted Hooch. "Get your teams to the center of the pitch now."

They all lined up and Hooch blew the whistle; a small boy from Ravenclaw was commentating.

For a moment, all Harry did was stand back and watch the game. The Gryffindor beaters were in no way Fred and George, but they played fair. Alex sent Romilda out of the game five minutes in with a broken jaw. Rebekah got back at her by scoring three times in a row, so Alex retaliated by aiming at Harry himself, but he was too fast for the aging bludger.

Harry viewed the game with fascinated interest; the Gryffindor beaters ganged up on Crabbe, who was finally knocked out when both bludgers hit him opposite sides of the head. Draco also had a close call with the hospital wing when he rammed purposely into Rebekah; she chased after him and tackled him in the air. From the Slytherin side, Harry could hear Pansy screaming.

"Katie Bell scored another point for Gryffindor!" Harry heard.

Wondering what Rebekah said to get out of being suspended from the game, Harry finally spotted the snitch. Draco was suspended high in the air, looking unaware and completely uncaring after his fray with the chaser, who was back to scoring more points on the Slytherins.

Harry took off after the snitch.

"It looks like Harry Potter, the Chosen One, has seen the snitch!"

At the sound of "the Chosen One" several things happened; Harry rolled his eyes, the Slytherin's booed, and Rebekah sped past him, giggling, with her brown hair whipping in the air behind her.

Suddenly, out of the corner of his eye, Harry noticed Alex, followed closely by a bludger she was obviously trying get in the right spot to hit. Harry was still trying hard to focus on the snitch, Draco (who was now chasing him), and Alex, who looked like she was going to run right into him.

"WATCH IT HA—"

Suddenly, she vanished. The crowd gasped as she disapparated, sending a huge crack that ricocheted across the field; several students and teachers got to their feet, looking for her.

The bludger she had been chasing hit Harry's side as his fingers laced around the snitch. He felt the snitch struggle in his hand and fell off his broom.

Alex apparated again, still on her broom, and crashed right into Draco. Once again, Harry could hear Pansy screaming as they all collapsed on the ground with a terrifying thump.

McGonagall and Snape were racing onto the field, followed closely by Hagrid, Madam Pomfrey and Ginny.

Harry shoved Draco off of him and immediately grabbed his side. His ribs were aching.

"Why hello, Draco," said Alex, and Draco shot her a confused look.

"Harry!" screamed Ginny, racing toward him. "That bludger hit you right on! Are you ok!"

Madam Pomfrey grumbled about the dangers of Quidditch while McGonagall stood behind her turned back, rolling her eyes. Snape helped Alex and Draco to their feet, ignoring Alex's "Why hello, Professor Snape."

"Come on, Potter," said Madam Pomfrey, helping him to his feet carefully. "Let's get you to the hospital wing."

She conjured a stretcher and Harry rode while he, Ginny, and Katie all talked about the game. Madam Pomfrey listened disapprovingly and barked at them when they laughed about Crabbe's fractured skull.


	10. The Halloween Masquerade

The month of October passed quickly with only Quidditch to entertain the students; Hermione cried daily about motherhood with Ginny, who was claiming that she was beginning to look fat (even though she wasn't). The two girls finally made up when Ginny decided to let Madam Pomfrey look at her after the disastrous first Quidditch match three weeks before. 

The matches had, in fact, calmed down quite a bit. McGonagall gathered all the Quidditch players together after an infamous game against Slytherin and Ravenclaw where Alex and Cho got into a huge aloft fist fight. Both Cho and Alex ended up in the hospital wing after a messy series of hexes from the angry players and McGonagall was furious; the Quidditch teams appeared to be crazier than she'd ever seen them. Her long speech was followed by a warning that she would halt the games altogether if any more trouble was started.

Hermione and Ron's classes were interrupted frequently by McGonagall, Snape, and other various Weasleys; Harry was spending more time away from them then he had ever spent. It didn't bother him too much because Ginny was around a lot and so was Luna (when she wasn't sneaking off somewhere), as were the two half-elves almost constantly; they both seemed to have an unusual taste for the spotlight that followed Harry around. He didn't mind too much though, because they reminded me distantly of Fred and George and had a fantastic sense of humor.

Rebekah, as it turned out, was the only one who seemed to believe Ginny's story. Alex, on the other hand, was still telling people that Harry was the father of both girls' babies, and they argued about it almost everyday.

Hermione didn't like Rebekah very much, however (and the dislike was returned), and Ron had a naïve prejudice held against Alex for being a Slytherin. She didn't seem to mind, though, she just flirted a lot and was always saying things like "Why hello, Mr. Weasley," and "Didn't I tell you we can apparate anywhere?"

Ron would scowl and Harry would choke on his cornflakes for laughing. Even Hermione found this amusing, because she realized Alex was only playing on Ron's grudge against Slytherins.

Hermione was annoyed by Rebekah's laziness with her schoolwork, even though, as Hermione put it, she had enough brains to get by as one of the better students. Ron wondered why Hermione would want competition, but only muttered this question to Harry as not to spark Hermione's rage. Rebekah and Alex contented themselves with Quidditch, and, as they put it, everyone's business.

Harry had started to notice that Ginny was getting stranger and stranger as her pregnancy progressed. Some days she would show up to class wearing her regular weekend clothes, and have to go back and change. She was always losing her books, but she commented casually one day that she knew them all and didn't need them anyway. Hermione shot Harry a worried look behind her back.

The small red-head had never been on good terms with McGonagall, but she had started to suck up in a way that even Hermione couldn't believe. Charms, suddenly, was her best subject, and she'd walked out on the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, Remus Lupin's twin brother Cassius (who most girls were positive was a vampire), claiming that it'd become pointless and she had no reason to stay. She was starting to remind Harry a little of Snape.

The students were all looking forward to Halloween until McGonagall appeared in front of the Great Hall about two weeks before announcing that there was to be a Halloween costume ball in the place of their regular feast. Harry was crushed because he hated balls, but Hermione and Ron seemed quite excited about it. He scowled at them as they both talked about it casually, but Harry was stressed out because he knew he'd either have to ask some girl or go stag, and he wasn't excited about either option.

He considered taking Luna as a friend, but he was scared of Snape and wrote that one out immediately. He also thought of Ginny, but he didn't want to give Alex any more ideas. Writing out Ginny made him think of Alex, but she was asked by the Ravenclaw Quidditch captain the day after the announcement. He thought of Rebekah, but she was quickly asked out by Blaise Zabini, Seamus Finnigan, Michael Corner, and a number of other boys before rejecting all of them for, they were surprised to hear, Neville; it appeared that she had finally admitted defeat when it came to Ron.

Harry finally made a decision about three days before the ball when he was sitting in the common room listening to the other Gryffindor's talk about their costumes. Ginny, he noticed, was sitting at one of the wooden tables working on her homework with very bloodshot eyes; Harry realized that she, despite still being very pretty, probably wouldn't get invited to go with anyone and decided that he would take her. A plethora of new gossip would come out of this development, but he wasn't entirely bothered by it.

"Ginny?" he said, approaching her quietly. She looked up and jumped.

"Yeah," she said, careful to avoid his eyes with her own red ones. She slid her book, the same one she had been reading earlier, over a little as he sat down across from her.

Taking a deep breath, he just blurted it out.

"Do you want to go to the Halloween ball with me?"

She gave him a doubtful look.

"Why do you want to go with me?"

Harry thought about this for a moment; he had a new and terrifying fear of pregnant girls, and didn't want to say anything he would regret.

"Well, you're…I just thought it would be weird to go with anyone else, you know, like Luna, or something…"

"Romilda really wants you to ask her," said Ginny. "She was talking about it in the dormitory," she finished and picked up her quill to write something random on her homework parchment.

"Oh, well…I'm kind of scared of Romilda, so—"

"Oh," said Ginny lamely.

"Well, if you don't want to go," said Harry, who hadn't been expecting this reaction. "You don't have to go with me—"

"I never said that," Ginny snapped. "What are you going as?"

Harry opened his mouth to respond and closed it again. He didn't know.

"I don't know."

"Well, most of the kids are getting theirs in Hogsmeade that afternoon…we'd have to get there early or we're not going to find anything."

"Right," said Harry.

"Have you thought about it at all?" asked Ginny, clearly not expecting anything.

"Um…no,' he said. "Can't we just go in dress robes?"

She gave him a look that clearly said "You're stupid."

"Well, what do you think of something medieval? Ooh!" she said, jumping slightly. "We can go as Hogwarts founders!"

Harry narrowed his eyes and gave her a look that clearly said "Seriously?"

"Shut up! It will be cool! We can go as Godric and Rowena," said Ginny. "I wonder where we're going to find costumes like that. Too bad Godric is a man; it'd be cool to go as the founder of Gryffindor." She shot him a look, as if it was his fault Godric was born a boy.

"Cool," said Harry, somewhat relieved to have found such a willing date.

"Meet me at the gate on Saturday morning, and we'll go looking together," said Ginny, going back to her work in a much cheerier mood. Harry merely nodded and went upstairs, grateful the whole 'find a date' thing was over.

In the next couple of days, Harry actually became sort of excited about the Halloween "masquerade" (as people had started calling it). A lot of people, Harry heard, were going as Greek gods and goddesses, pixies, werewolves, vampires, and, he was amused to discover, muggles.

"What are you two going as," Harry asked Hermione and Ron as they walked toward the gate. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Ginny and her red hair running towards them, trying to catch up, so he stopped. Hermione and Ron saw what he was doing, and did the same.

"We were thinking a bride and groom," said Ron casually.

"I don't know if we should do that, though," said Hermione, looking suddenly dark. "I mean, it'd only give people more to talk about."

"Hey," said Ginny, out of breath. "I woke up late. You two looking for costumes as well?"

Hermione and Ron nodded.

"What are you guys going to wear?" asked Ron.

"Hogwarts founders," said Ginny happily as Harry scratched his nose nervously. "Rowena and Godric."

"That's cool!" said Hermione. "Ron, we should go as Hufflepuff and Slytherin!"

Ron gave her a terrified look.

"Me? Go as Slytherin? Are you crazy? They'd kill me! They call me the blood traitor, they'd have my—"

"Well, we're all going as a different founder, Ron," said Ginny. "All except for Harry. We'll all be different too."

"Yeah," said Hermione. "Besides—do you think it would be better if I went as the founder of Slytherin? I mean, that'd really make them angrier than anything, especially more than you."

Ron sighed, admitting defeat.

"Good!" said Hermione. "Then that's settled."

Hermione, Harry, Ron, and Ginny spent all day looking for something to wear to the ball. Hermione and Ron found what they were looking for the fastest, but Ginny had a lot of trouble finding something. The second-hand shop they went into didn't look to have much of anything at first, but the shop keeper, Madam West, ushered them into the attic where an array of things were hidden.

Hermione's gown was long and black, but she was afraid it was too plain; the woman at the second-hand dress store was very accommodating though, and found a long yellow sash that she draped on Hermione's shoulders. The affect was beautiful and she looked just like anyone would expect Helga Hufflepuff to look; out of the spotlight, but elegant and radiant at the same time.

Ron, for one, couldn't take his eyes off of her.

Ron found a set of dark green robes that made his green hair look very interesting. He wore interesting black trousers and a velvet vest under his robes, along with black boots and black gloves. He was afraid he looked silly, but Hermione and Ginny thought he looked brilliant so he didn't question them. Harry said he looked very cunning and evil, and they all laughed.

Harry also had a hard time finding something to wear; his suit was a little harder to pick out than Ron's, because red wasn't really a common dress color. He finally decided on a red tunic and odd, medieval looking pants like Ron's. He looked in the mirror and thought he was on fire because of all the red, but everyone said he looked good. He bought and old pair of high, black boots, and black gloves. Ron ran downstairs for a minute to pull an old toy sword out of a pile of junk and shoved it at him, grinning.

Ginny's dress was the hardest to find; one dress they found looked good, but they were disappointed to find that it had a giant dark stain on the front (it was also a tad big in the front). They went through dress after dress after dress until finally Madam West disappeared with a squeak shouting "I can't believe I forgot!" and appeared a few seconds later with a long, dark blue gown.

Hermione teared up and said "You look so pretty!" when Ginny came out of the dressing room. Ron stared at the dress disapprovingly, and Harry only looked at her. The dress was long and thin, and was a little more revealing than Hermione's. It was sleeveless, and quite form fitting around her waist and shoulders, although it did flare out at the bottom like Hermione's. Harry could understand why Ron would be wary about it, but he didn't mind as much. Madam West found a bronze chain belt and put it around her waist so you could see it plainly against the dark blue. Finally, the shop keeper found sleeveless robes made out of some kind of semi-transparent, white fabric so the dress wasn't quite so revealing, but also so you could still see the dark blue underneath. Ron was satisfied, but Harry thought this was funny; the robes only made her look more like an Egyptian goddess than she had before.

When they were done, they all bought plain, black masks from the nearby odds-and-ends store (although Harry was pretty sure people would know it was them anyway). The black mask could not, in any way, cover up Ron or Ginny's hair, and Harry's scar was still visible. After remarking that they looked like superheroes, Ron said "What's a superhero?" and they all left while Hermione and Harry shook their heads.

Hermione, Harry, Ron, and Ginny all met up with Luna, Neville, Rebekah, Alex, and the Ravenclaw Quidditch captain, a boy named Leon Wright, who Harry had never met before. They went to The Three Broomsticks and had Butterbeers while they discussed their costumes (Rebekah, Alex, and Luna were all going as characters from a muggle book Harry had never read, but knew was very popular). Neville and the Quidditch captain were going as "Orcs", and Harry neither knew nor cared what an "Orc" was.

After a long day in Hogsmeade, they all went back to the school so they could rest, change, and get ready in their dormitories. Seamus Finnigan was going with Lavender Brown as vampires, and Dean Thomas was nowhere to be found, as usual. Around seven thirty, all the kids started to wrestle their brilliant costumes on and they all made their way toward the Great Hall.

Harry, Hermione, Ginny and Ron all gasped as they entered the Great Hall. The ghosts, ones Harry knew and others he'd never seen before, were already dancing to the eerie music coming from an old, battered organ and several other stringed instruments. Long, black, moth-eaten curtains were hanging from the walls and even the teachers, Harry noticed, had donned disguises for the event. The sky above them was cracking with lightning and gloomy with rain and clouds, although Harry was sure it had been sunny a few hours before.

The students all looked brilliant in their costumes, but, as Harry noticed, the Hogwarts founders seemed to be making an impression. The Hufflepuff ghost, the fat friar, was delighted and actually bowed to Hermione, who bowed back happily.

The Slytherins looked at Ron and gave him scathing looks, which he returned.

Ginny made Harry dance (who had forgotten how since the last time he had to at the Yule Ball), and Hermione and Ron both danced as well. When Harry was tired of making a fool of himself, they sat down and ate with Luna, Rebekah, Alex, Leon, and Neville. The three girls all looked stunning, but Neville and Leon looked absolutely ridiculous. Rebekah had bewitched her hair blonde and was wearing a white, willowy dress. Alex was wearing a dark blue dress and a veil over her head. Luna, lastly, didn't do anything with her hair, and she looked pretty in a green gown.

They all had a good laugh when Luna danced with Neville in his Orc costume, which he kept tripping on.

Tired of the bad organ music and dancing, Ginny and Harry decided to go back to the common room. As it turned out, Hermione and Ron had disappeared around 10 o'clock, but Ginny and Harry left anyway.

The two students went back to the common room where a huge party was still raving; Hermione and Ron were not there, but Harry stayed up with the rest of the Gryffindors. An assortment of Gryffindors and other random students from all different houses stayed up until they crashed, exhausted, all over the Gryffindor common room.


	11. The Prophecy

Harry, Hermione, Ginny, and Ron were all collected less than an hour later. When they entered Dumbledore's office, Harry was sure he had never seen so many people cramped into what was normally a good-sized space; Lupin was standing around Snape's desk with Moody, Tonks, Mr. Weasley, Trelawney, McGonagall, Kingsley Shacklebolt, Madam Pomfrey, Professor Flitwick, Mundungus Fletcher, and Bill, Fred, and George Weasley. Harry suddenly noticed Mrs. Weasley, who was standing far in the corner in the dark.

The four students walked to the room and the people standing there cleared away a space for them to walk. Hermione and Ron were all looking around, taking in the different faces, and Ginny was looking at the floor.

"What's going on," asked Harry. "What's this—"

"Potter, one of you is going to have to do us a favor," said McGonagall. "We need the memory from one of your minds."

Harry and the other three all glanced at each other.

"I'll do it," said Harry, pulling out his wand. Professor Lupin moved a little to the left and Harry could see that the pensieve was out on Dumbledore's old desk.

"Focus very hard on the memory, Harry, and put the tip of your wand up to your head, like this," Mr. Weasley said, guiding Harry's arm. "Now pull it out, like a thread."

Harry was still somewhat surprised to see the long, silvery memory dangling from the end of his wand. He placed it in the pensieve and the contents of the bowl swirled. Trelawney, who looked as if she didn't really understand why she was there, gave McGonagall a doubtful look.

"You go first, Harry," said Tonks.

He shot her a terrified look.

"What? Why do I have to go—?"

"We need to make sure what you said is correct, Harry," said McGonagall. "We're all going."

He looked at Lupin and the greying man nodded hopefully.

Harry touched his wand to the memory and had the distinct feeling like he was falling.

Suddenly, he was on the ground on the Quidditch Pitch. He was looking at himself and at the game. Nearby, Hermione and Ginny were talking to each other. Suddenly, Mr. Weasley appeared. Then, right after that, Lupin. Hermione, who was followed by Ron and Ginny, followed Lupin. Then came McGonagall, followed by Snape, Moody, and Trelawney.

Trelawney, still, looked as if she didn't know why she was there, and Harry wondered if maybe it would have been good to tell her what was going on.

"Yeah right," said Allison, one of the Beaters. She walked past them as if they were not there, talking to Marissa. "The closest you're going to get to the Chudley Cannons is that picture of...um...oh, goodness, I can't remember the seekers name...that Ron Weasley keeps on his walls."

"For your information, the seeker..." Marissa's voice faded away as they both walked out of earshot.

Harry turned sharply and spotted Trelawney, who was stumbling towards them.

"How did I...?" wondered Trelawney, disturbed by her own stumbling. Her cheeks turned a little pink.

Harry watched himself. He was still floating somewhere over the goals.

They all backed out of the way as Trelawney came stumbling forward, clutching a bottle of cooking sherry. Harry kept looking back at himself, and apparently his memory-self had finally noticed.

"Completely ignoring—whoops! Oh dear," said Trelawney, dropping the bottle. She bent over slowly and picked it back up.

"Professor? Professor Trelawney?"

Harry watched as Hermione and Ginny came running up. Several other players landed; Ron fell onto the ground right behind him.

"What are you doing out on the field—"

Trelawney grabbed his shoulder and Harry felt it sort of burn as he heard himself shout out. He could still feel the memory of it.

"THE TRANSFORMATION HAS ALREADY BEGUN."

Memory Hermione looked positively shocked.

"THE CHILD BORN IN SEVEN MONTHS TIME TO THE MOTHER UNLOVED BY HER PEERS…SHE WILL BRING INTO THIS EARTH THE HEIR WHO SPARRED THE GREY ONE. HE WILL SUCCEED IN THE BODY OF THE SERVANT WHO HAS RISKED HER LIFE TO THWART HIM AND MINGLED IN THE DARKNESS OF HIS DORMANCY…"

At these words, the memory of Ginny gasped.

"AND SHE WILL DIE IN DESPAIR OR LIE IN BLAIM FOREVER FOR THE FALL OF THE MARKED BOY, THE ONE CALLED CHOSEN…HE WILL FOREVER BE MARKED, BE FOREVER TAINTED…HIS FUTURE WILL BE DECIDED AT THE MERCIFUL HANDS OF HIS FRIE— "

Just as she had done mere hours before, Trelawney hiccuped and was knocked out of it.

Whatever the memory of Trelawney said after that was blocked out by the current Trelawney screaming.

"WHAT? WHAT?"

"Professor, please!" shouted Lupin.

"I think that's all we need to see," said McGonagall, grabbing his shoulder and lifting him out.

Harry fell back from the table. The remaining members of the group inside the pensieve came out, one by one. Fred, George, and Molly Weasley all looked petrified.

"Well?" asked Fred. "Well, what'd it say?"

"I—" started McGonagall. She looked at Harry.

"So it's true?" asked Molly Weasley. "After everything that's happened? Dumbledore, and...and...it's true?"

"Yes," said Harry, quite sure he knew what this prophesy meant. "It's true."

"The Dark Lord?" asked Tonks.

"Oh no," wailed Ginny, clutching her stomach. "No!" She toppled over and fainted just as George was rushing out to catch her.

"Madam Pomfrey, please take Ginny to the hospital wing," McGonagall said, conjuring a stretcher. "Mrs. Weasley?"

Molly Weasley nodded and followed the unconscious girl out the door.

"And she said Oliver Wood, right?" Mr. Weasley asked McGonagall. The old woman nodded frantically.

"Well, then it could be either one of them!" shouted Fred angrily. "The prophesy doesn't say anything about the difference between the two—"

"Professor," said Hermione meekly. "I think it's me..."

Everyone turned, suddenly, looking at her.

"Well, that's what it said, didn't it? That...that...'he will be born to the one unloved by her peers'. Doesn't that mean dirty blood? Ginny's never—I mean, everybody loves Ginny—"

"We can't possibly know that for sure, Hermione," said Moody, although he didn't look all that convinced, even as he said it. Harry, unfortunately, was thinking along the same lines as Hermione.

"But—but Ginny was acting so strange," tried Ron. "Couldn't she—"

"She was pregnant!" added Tonks. "Any girl acts weird when she's pregnant. I'm sure Hermione did!"

Harry thought for a moment that Hermione acted strange in a very different way, but said nothing.

"Well..." tried Ron, glancing at Hermione. She looked crushed, as if nothing anyone could say would change her mind.

"But, we can't possibly know anything for sure," said McGonagall, patting Hermione's shoulder. "The only thing we can do is wait. How long have both girls been pregnant?"

"Nearly the same amount of time," said Ron. "But Ginny wouldn't let anybody near her, so we still don't know for sure if she's telling the truth."

"I think she's telling the truth now," said Lupin. "Now that she knows it's so important."

"Yeah, well..." he shot Hermione a depressed look.

"So...what does this mean?" asked Harry. "How can we defeat him? We can't kill a baby—"

"If that's what it takes to beat him, then that's how it'll have to go—" added Fred.

"What if we get rid of one baby and find out it's the wrong one?" asked McGonagall. "Obviously we can't destroy one perfectly healthy child for the sake of—!"

"Do you have any idea what this means?" hissed Snape. "Dumbledore gave his life—"

"Dumbledore wouldn't have wanted the innocent to be killed, Severus!" screeched McGonagall.

"Dumbledore didn't stand a chance, Minerva. What hope does a teenage girl have?"

At this, Hermione looked horrified and Mr. Weasley grew very pale.

"Hermione, Ron, Harry," he said. "Let's go down to the kitchens and get something to eat, shall we?"

Mr. Weasley, George, and Fred shoved the three students out of the room.


	12. Trelawny's Bad Day

"What a horrible thing to say," Harry could hear Rebekah saying from somewhere nearby. "Your sense of humor is positively wretched."  
Harry opened his eyes and look around the room. Rebekah and Alex were sitting on Ron's bed, across from his own; Alex had a camera in her hand and Rebekah was giving her a look that was sort of half-exasperated, half-amused.

When they spotted looking at him, they both grinned and Alex snapped a photo of him.

"Ron's gonna love this one," she said, giving him a knowing look.

"What?"

Rebekah pointed somewhere over his shoulder and he turned. The minute he did, he jumped. Ginny was lying on the bed next to him, still wearing her costume from the night before. Harry was too, but he still thought it was a little weird. This wasn't very odd, because Ginny had been sitting next to him, the night before, playing a game of wizard chess after the ball, but he knew that some people would think it was something other than it was.

"We didn't!"

"We know," said Rebekah, glaring at Alex. "Put that bloody thing away."

"I'm going to bewitch it to make it mooove," said Alex in a sing-song voice.

Harry jumped out of bed to grab the camera, but Alex disapparated with a crack. This woke up Neville, who still had a mask attached to his face.

Ron came strolling through the door; his robes were gone. He was much disheveled and his vest was torn at the shoulder. He looked around at the mess and started to laugh.

"What the hell happened in here?" he said, looking at all the people thrown all over the room. "What's—GINNY!"

Harry looked at Ron quickly and wondered where his wand was.

"What are you doing in Harry's bed!" he shouted, and she woke up slightly.

"Why is your vest torn, Ron?" asked Harry. "Things get a little shaky last night?"

Ron glared at him.

"Mom would kill you if she knew stuff like that was still going on," said Ginny, falling back onto Harry's pillow groggily. She started to snore slightly.

"Nothing happened, Weasels," said Rebekah. Ron glared at her too. "I was here the whole night. Granted…I was asleep the whole time, so I might've missed something…"

She glanced at Harry.

"But I doubt it."

Hermione, apparently, showed up around the same time as Ron. A lot of kids were still downstairs in the common room, asleep on chairs and by the fireplace.

"Surely McGonagall would know stuff like this would happen if they threw a ball," said Ron. "Why do they even bother? It just creates more trouble."

"Because they know that stuff like this would happen anyway, Ronald," said Hermione, throwing him a knowing look.

They blushed and giggled. The rest of the people in the room became very queasy.

Ginny woke up and went into her own Common Room. Rebekah did the same, and Luna departed a little while later. Ron, Hermione, and Harry all went to the breakfast they were sure they'd missed, but apparently a lot of students were waking up late. They sat down at their table and Alex walked by; she winked at Harry.

Professor Trelawney walked into the Great Hall looking sick and tired; she was swaying slightly as she walked. She sat down at the front of the room and choked down a cup of coffee.

"She looks happy," said Hermione.

Ron and Harry decided they wanted to go out to the Quidditch pitch for some practice, so they gathered their brooms and gear and headed in that direction. Hermione and Ginny walked after them and talked about the dance, which everyone had apparently enjoyed immensely.

Rebekah and Alex apparated out of nowhere and joined them in the pitch. A little while later, Katie Bell came out for a go and so did Romilda Vane, who looked as if she'd put on an awful lot of makeup for a simple Quidditch practice.

When they heard that everyone was practicing, the beaters ran out onto the field and joined them. Allison, a quiet blonde, was very good, but the louder one had some work to do.

For a moment, Harry didn't even realize how strange it was for Professor Trelawney to be standing on the field far below. When he finally registered her crazy appearance and startled expression, he went to the ground and walked toward her.

"Professor?" asked Harry. "Professor Trelawney?"

"Yes, dear? Do you need something?" she looked dazed and was holding some cooking sherry.

Following his lead, several of the players had also landed nearby. Hermione and Ginny were running onto the field giving the teacher wary looks.

"What are you doing on the field—"

Suddenly, Professor Trelawney went funny again.

"THE TRANSFORMATION HAS ALREADY BEGUN," she screeched. Her hand latched onto his shoulder, burning his skin; he cried out in pain. "THE CHILD BORN IN SEVEN MONTHS TIME TO THE FRIEND UNLOVED BY HER PEERS...SHE WILL BE GIFTED WITH UNRIVALED UNDERSTANDING AND MAY BE THE SOLE CARRIER TO BRING INTO THIS EARTH THE HEIR WHO SPARRED THE GREY WIZARD...HE WILL SUCCEED IN THE BODY OF THE SERVANT WHO HAS RISKED HER LIFE TO THWART HIM AND MINGLED IN THE DARKNESS OF HIS DORMANCY…AND SHE WILL EITHER DIE IN DESPAIR OR LIE IN BLAIM FOREVER FOR THE FALL OF THE MARKED BOY, THE ONE CALLED CHOSEN…HE WILL FOREVER BE MARKED, BE FOREVER TAINTED BY HER…THE FUTURE WILL BE DECIDED AT THE MERCIFUL HANDS OF HIS FRIE— "

Trelawney hiccupped and was knocked out of it.

"What's going on?" she asked vaguely. "Is it time for the game?"

They stared at her.

"Things are so much more interesting here than they are in Texas," said Rebekah in a whisper to Alex. She nodded.

Hermione and Ginny, on the other hand, were looking at each other with stunned expressions on their faces.

"Wait a minute, did she say 'mother unloved by her peers'? What does that mean!" Hermione insisted frantically. "RON! WHAT DOES THAT MEAN!"

"I DON'T KNOW!" he shouted back, looking just as terrified.

"I can't remember the rest!" Hermione was saying as she started to shake. "I don't remember what she said—HEY! COME BACK!"

"Don't, Hermione, she won't be able to remember anything," said Harry. "She couldn't remember what she'd said after the prophesy about Pettigrew, and she's not going to remember now."

"She said 'forever be at the mercy of his friends', right?" asked Ginny. "What does that mean? Do you think there was more to the prophesy, or is that all—"

"GINNY, SHE'S TALKING ABOUT ONE OF US!" screeched Hermione. "She said 'risked her life to thwart him', didn't she? That could be either one of us! And what does she mean, 'mingled in the darkness of his'—"

"I don't know, Hermione!" shouted Harry. He was thinking over the prophesy in his mind just as quickly. Something about 'downfall of the chosen one', or 'forever tainted', or something…

"Let's go to McGonagall," said Ron. "She'll know what to do. We'll tell her what happened."

"NO!" screamed Ginny. "It'll just freak her out—"

"COME ON, GINNY! WE HAVE TO!" screamed Hermione.

Harry and Hermione grabbed Rebekah's arm and she disapparated them to the building. Alex did the same with Ginny and Ron, who appeared a second later in front of McGonagall's office. Harry knocked on the door apprehensively.

"Yes—oh, hello Potter," she said, eyeing the group. "Is there something wrong?"

"Professor Trelawney just had a prediction," squeaked Hermione. "A real one! About us!" She motioned between her and Ginny. "And Harry!"

"Miss Granger, you know as well as I—"

"No," said Harry. "It was real. She's done it before, even Dumbledore said so."

McGonagall gave him a cold, calculating look.

"Come in," she said finally, and they hurried through the door. "What happened?"

"Well, she went sort-of weird," said Ron. "She had this blurry look in her eyes like she couldn't see anything, but she was looking right at Harry just a second before. Then she went all stiff and grabbed his arm, and he started to shout, and she started to spout out all this nonsense about a mother, and something's downfall, and dieing in despair—"

"Yeah," said Hermione. "She said that the friend of the Chosen One will be the mother who carries the heir who fought 'the grey wizard'—"

"And that she'd either have to die or live in blame for the rest of her life for the fall of the Chosen One," finished Ginny softly.

McGonagall looked in-between the four students quietly.

"Stay here," she barked. "I'm going to find the headmaster."

McGonagall returned in a flash with Professor Snape, who looked less than excited to be there.

"Tell him what you told me, Miss Weasley," commanded McGonagall.

They repeated the story the best they could, but Harry was a little afraid that they were starting to forget parts of it.

"The heir who fought the grey wizard?" Snape asked McGonagall, and she nodded fervently.

"Ginny!" said Alex suddenly from the back of the room. "You're the one who said there was no father, right? Well, maybe it's not Hermione, you—"

"No!" shouted Ginny frantically. "I was lying, I…I didn't want people to judge, I didn't know—"

"Well who was it then," said Ron, considerably annoyed.

She gulped in a breath of air.

"Oliver Wood," she said suddenly.

No one said anything for a moment, but they all shot her doubtful looks.

"Oliver Wood," repeated Harry, thinking quietly to himself that she must be lying.

"After Dumbledore's funeral," she said quickly. "He was at the Leaky Cauldron too—"

"Oliver Wood," Ron said, looking slightly bewildered. "But you don't know—"

"We met there!" she spat at him, her cheeks red. "Don't tell me who I do and do not know!"

"Well, that settles it," said McGonagall. "Severus, I think it's about time we called Remus and Moody…and we better get a hold of Arthur, quickly."

Snape nodded his head curtly.

"Of course," he said, giving the students ugly looks, and without another word, swept from the room.

"Ginny, Hermione, Harry, Ron," she said, looking tired. "You best go back to Gryffindor Tower. Don't go wandering around or anything—no, Mr. Weasley, you can't go to the Quidditch pitch—because I'll probably be sending for you within the hour. I'm sending for the Order and I'm going to have your parents here as soon as the Knight Bus can get them here."

"Professor—"

"I'm sorry, Harry," she said, interrupting him. "I can't tell you anything until I've heard the whole prophesy and I'm not going to base any theories on the scattered memories of four teenagers. Go to your Common Room or the Great Hall, but do not wander off."

Without another word, she shoved them out of the office and stomped noisily down the hallway.

"She thinks there's something, then," said Hermione, looking petrified. "She thinks it means something, doesn't she?"

Hermione looked at Harry, but he, if possible, knew less than she.


	13. The Traitor

"I think I'm going to be sick," said Hermione, and she immediately doubled over and retched all over the floor next to Dumbledore's old office. Fred and George backed away, frightened.

"Urgh," said Ron, trying to pull her hair out of the way.

"Maybe Hermione should go to the hospital wing, Ron," said Fred, still staring at her warily.

"Yeah, I know," said Ron, helping her up.

"I'd show her," said someone behind them. Ron was hobbling toward the hospital wing with Hermione, but Fred, George, Mr. Weasley, and Harry all turned.

Pansy Parkinson was holding the stuffed animal of a polar bear in her hands. It was very battered looking, one of the eyes was missing, and the fake fur looked as if it had been ripped out. Pansy herself was muttering softly under her breath, and eyeing the ceilings with a wide, crazy look in her eyes. Harry noticed that she was stroking the fur, sometimes jerking at it, so that little wisps of it came out and floated to the floor like glitter.

"Pansy?" asked Harry. She was looking out the window, and made no notice of them.

"She'd get it," said Pansy. She had dark shadows under her eyes and she looked paler than usual. "I'd show her—what's that?"

She held the bear up to her ear.

Fred tossed Harry another frightened look.

"Yes, honey," she said, stroking the bear some more. "We wouldn't let her touch you, would we? We can't let her take you away from me..."

Harry made a mental note to never date Pansy.

"What is happening to this school?" asked George, as Mr. Weasley pulled the three boys away from Pansy. "Girl's going crazy and pregnant and getting possessed all over the place..."

"Many things have happened that we can't control, Fred. Dumbledore was like a staple to this school. Without him, there's nothing."

They continued toward the school's kitchen and a house elf ran by, clutching a mop.

"Good evening sirs," said the house elf at the door to the kitchen. She tickled the pear and the door slid open.

"Good evening sirs," came a chorus of voices. The four men jumped.

"Can we get something for you?" asked Winky, who looked less drunk than she normally did.

"Let me get you something," said another elf, pulling up four chairs.

"Look, Harry," said Mr. Weasley, drinking a glass of water. "I know this is all nerve wracking, for all of us, but you must stay calm, and stay brave. Hermione and Ginny will need the utmost protection if news like this gets out."

Harry nodded. He already knew this.

"Yeah," said Fred, taking a sip of butterbeer. "Hermione and Ginny—"

"Sirs!"

Harry and the three Weasleys turned, where Dobby was standing close to a large oven.

"There's some kind of trouble in the Great Hall, sirs!" said Dobby. "The Headmaster is looking for you—the girl is gone! Disappeared! Harry's Weezy—"

"What?" shouted Mr. Weasley, and the four of them burst through the door and clambered down the hallway back toward the Great Hall.

"What happened?" shouted Mr. Weasley at a terrified Molly Weasley. Ginny was in the corner, crying.

"She's gone! And Ron—"

Harry stepped over, afraid of what he would find. In the middle of a huge crowd of Order Members and teachers, Ron lay on the floor, bleeding heavily from a wound on his chest.

"RON!" Harry shouted, and he pushed through the adults.

"Harry, don't touch him," said Madam Pomfrey. "He'll be ok, don't move—"

"What happened?" Harry shouted at the circle of adults.

"We don't—Harry, we just walked in—"

"Where's Hermione?"

"She's gone," choked Ron. The adults stared at him.

"Neville—Lucius—Rodolphus," said Ron, still having trouble breathing.

"Neville?" asked Harry incredulously. "How did—"

"Hogwarts-Azkaban Outreach Association," sputtered Ron. "He wrote a letter to that awful—"

"Neville," fumed Ginny, very red in the face. "I'm going to kill that worthless—"

"No," said McGonagall. "Miss Weasley, you aren't going anywhere, you're in as much danger as Hermione."

"No," said Ginny, shaking her head. "They shouldn't have taken Hermione, it was me—"

"There's no possible way we can know that, Ginny," said Mrs. Weasley, trying to pull her onto her feet.

"No, I lied."

The room went quiet.

"What?" asked Lupin.

"Remember when I told you that...that the baby's father was Oliver—Oliver Wood?"

Madam Pomfrey had healed Ron's shoulder, and he was sitting propped up on his elbow, staring at her with accusing eyes.

"I lied...It wasn't Oliver," she said. Mrs. Weasley had let go of her, and was standing a few feet away, almost as if she was afraid to touch the girl. "When I heard the prophecy, I knew that it must mean—"

"Then why did you lie?" screeched Ron. "Now Hermione's gone, and—"

"Ron," said McGonagall. "We wouldn't want either girl to be in danger—"

"I'm sorry they stole your precious girlfriend!" spat Ginny. "Like I had any control over it! You prefer it had been me or something?"

"I didn't say that, Ginny," he said tiredly, as Madam Pomfrey messed with his shoulder. "If you'd only told us sooner—"

"What would you have done?" she yelled at him. "If you'd been me, if you'd suddenly started to lose track and forget where you were again? If someone told you that you were pregnant and you'd never—"

"Come on Ginny," said Harry, pulling her angry eyes away from Ron, who looked as if he didn't quit know what to say. "Sit down a bit."

"Now what?" asked Molly, still scared. "Now that we know, how are we going to save Hermione and hide Ginny?"

"What do we do about—you know—in there?" asked Fred, gesturing toward Ginny with little nods of his head.

"What are we going to do about Hermione?" shouted Ron, looking frantic.

For some reason, Mrs. Weasley, Ron, Lupin, McGonagall, Mr. Weasley, and a number of other people were all looking at Harry. Ginny was staring at the floor.

"What?" he asked.

"Well...you've fought the Dark Lord more than any of us, Potter," sneered Snape. "Surely you can—"

Harry shot a frantic look at Ginny.

"I can't fight her!" he said, pointing at Ginny. "What do you expect me to do about it?"

"Well," said Trelawney. "Let's think about the prophesy." She was looking very proud and dignified.

"Mother unloved by her peers," said Fred quietly. "What does that mean? I thought that meant muggle-born."

"Maybe it meant blood traitor," said Harry coldly.

"Mingled in the darkness of his dormancy," said Mrs. Weasley.

"I've been possessed before," said Ginny matter-of-factly.

"Ah," said George. "I didn't really get that the first time I heard it."

"That still doesn't change the fact that either me or Harry has to die," said Ginny so emotionlessly that several of the adults gasped.

"It's not—we don't know for sure—" sputtered Lupin.

"We can't possibly know that's what it means," said McGonagall firmly. "We're just going to have to wait, and we'll find out soon enough."

"So there's no way to get rid of it?" asked Ginny.

"The Dark Lord would have seen it so," said Severus Snape from the corner. "He knew we would discover the truth, and he would have ways to make himself unbeatable."

"Fantastic," said Ginny with a mirthless laugh.

"What now?" asked Harry. "What happens to Ginny now? Where is she going to go? How are we going to get Hermione back?"

"We don't know anything yet, Harry," said Lupin.

"The grandmother," said Harry. "Neville's grandmother. What was her name? Someone needs to find her."

They all looked at him.

"Ok," said Moony doubtfully.

"Well do it!" said Harry grouchily. "Ask her to try and communicate with Neville. The sooner we get him back, the better."

It was at this moment that Harry suddenly noticed Luna, who walked in through the door to the Great Hall.

"Oh, hello Harry," she said. "What's everyone doing here?"

They stared blankly. Luna looked at his feet.

"Your shoes look angry," she remarked. Harry stared at her.

"Luna, maybe you should give us a moment—" tried Mr. Weasley.

"No, she won't say anything," said Snape. Harry tried to act like he knew nothing and McGonagall threw Snape a funny look.

"We'll talk about this tomorrow, Potter," said McGonagall. "You may go."

"What about Hermione?" asked Harry. "Will Ron and I—"

"No," said Mr. Weasley firmly. "The Order will deal with it—"

"What? That's not fair!" said Ron. "It's my girlfriend, it's my baby!"

"Ron," said Molly, exhausted. "Please don't—"

"Well," said Ginny quite calmly. "I'm going to bed."

"Fine," said Ron, getting to his feet and rubbing his newly healed shoulder. "I'm going to the library."

He walked out the door after Ginny. Harry stared at him, thinking The Library?

"I'm going," said Harry, and without another word, he left the room.


	14. Warlocks, Parseltongue, and Snogging

The news about Hermione's kidnapping spread like wildfire and Harry's smart, bushy-haired friend had never been more popular. People were also treating Ron with a newfound respect, but this didn't really surprise Harry at all because he'd been a great deal angrier than he normally was.

Ron had been spending a great deal of time in the bathroom and the library, where Madam Pince told Harry he'd been sitting in the back, crying.

A month had passed and no news had come of Hermione, Neville, or the other Death Eaters. Ginny, on the other hand, had made quite a turn.

They knew that the teenage girl was a great deal more dangerous than she had been before, but there wasn't much to do about it. They couldn't take her out of school—she'd already tried that, but she ended up badly burning three Order members. She'd also rounded up a new group of gloomy looking yes-men, including Blaise Zabini, Icicle (no one knew her last name), Crabbe, and Goyle. They followed her everywhere, and were endlessly annoying.

Pansy, on the other hand, seemed to have completely lost her mind. She quit showing up to classes, and even when she did, she always fell asleep. Some of the other Slytherin girls said she was sneaking out at night, but no one could discover where she was going. Draco, to Pansy's horror, was still dating Icicle, who was more obnoxious than Harry felt he had patience for.

Ginny was forgetting who people were more and more. She avoided Harry as much as possible, acted like she didn't know who Ron was, and talked to Crabbe like they had known each other since they were children. The only normal thing about the girl was that she'd always hated Pansy Parkinson, and Pansy Parkinson still hated her.

In fact, they hated each other so much that it was beginning to cause problems. Pansy had obviously lost her mind and Ginny was only making it worse.

"Harry!" called Seamus, catching up to him on their way to Potions. "Where's Ron?"

Harry shrugged.

"I wouldn't know," said Harry. "Don't ask me."

"The library, probably," said Seamus. "Or crying in that girls bathroom with the ghost."

"Myrtle's?" asked Harry, somewhat amused in spite of himself. He hated that bathroom, but it wouldn't surprise him if Ron went in there to walk down memory lane.

"Yeah," said Seamus. "That's the one."

"HARRY!" Luna was screaming. "HARRY? DEAR GOD, WOMAN! WHERE'S HARRY?"

Harry and Seamus looked for her in the crowd. Luna had grabbed a small fourth year by the shoulders and was shaking her slightly.

"WHERE'S HARRY!" she was screaming. "WHERE—!"

"LUNA!" called Harry. "What—?"

"Holy shrieking fairies, Harry," she said. "Its Ginny! She's gone crazy, she's going to kill Pans—"

"What? Where?"

"The courtyard, they were—"

Harry and Seamus started to run toward the courtyard while Luna shouted explanations in their ears. Apparently, Pansy was crazier than even they'd thought.

"—And so Pansy said that she'd look better if—Harry! There!"

Luna pointed at the doors, where it was obvious that there was a problem.

"Where's McGonagall?" asked Seamus through gasps. "Where's Snape?"

"Ginny!" shouted Harry. There was a crowd of people standing around in a huge clearing next to the lake. Even the giant squid was pushed a little over the surface of the water.

"Get out of the way!" said Harry, pushing Goyle into some girl from Ravenclaw Harry didn't recognize.

"Ginny!" he shouted again.

But it was very obvious that Ginny didn't hear him. Behind Harry, Fred, McGonagall, Lupin, Snape, and Mr. Weasley were all walking out onto the courtyard after a meeting of the Order.

"What's going on here?" asked McGonagall. She froze when she saw Ginny and Pansy.

When Harry looked at Ginny, he had a sudden flashback to two years before, when he had come face to face with Lord Voldemort and his followers, the Death Eaters. He couldn't help but notice that her eyes were lined with red and they'd somewhat changed shape.

"Give it to me," Ginny was screeching at the girl, almost in a hiss. Harry looked at the crowd of people, who were whispering to each other.

"What'd she say?" asked Chang.

It was then when Harry suddenly realized she was speaking Parseltongue.

"Ginny," said Harry, in Parseltongue. "What are you doing? Get away from Pansy."

"DON'T SPEAK TO ME IN SNAKE LANGUAGE, POTTER," she hissed, turning on him. People were giving them scared looks. Harry noticed that her belly was starting to stick out a little bit, and he wondered what Hermione looked like.

Pansy was obviously very angry. She still had the bear in her hands, ripping the fur out little by little.

"Don't tell me what to do," Pansy said quite calmly.

Ginny pulled out her wand and pointed it at the girl.

"I'm warning you, filth," Ginny said. Pansy made no visible reaction. "Give me the bear."

"Why do you want it so badly?" asked Pansy. Harry couldn't, for the life of him, figure out how Pansy could understand Parseltongue. Parseltmouths were supposed to be very rare.

Ginny aimed her wand at Pansy and a silvery light came out the other end. It hit Pansy square on the chest and the dark-haired girl flew backwards, landing, miraculously, somewhat on her feet. Pansy adjusted her robes walked straight toward Ginny, stretched out her hand, and said something in a frighteningly deep voice in some language Harry couldn't understand.

The next thing that happened was a shock to all of them.

Pansy was surrounded by a swirl of red light, and a blast of red flame shot straight at Ginny Weasley. The blast hit her, and she too flew backwards, landing somewhat on her feet.

"STOP! STOP!" screamed McGonagall bravely. Harry wouldn't have wanted to interfere.

"Luna!" said Harry, leaning over toward her. "On the count of three, impedimenta. Ok? Seamus, you too."

They nodded, pointing their wands at Ginny, who they assumed had started the trouble. She was already starting toward Pansy again.

"One...two...three! IMPEDIMENTA!"

Ginny froze in her place.

"Thank you," said Pansy, looking saner than she had in days. She stuck her hands into the pockets of her robes. People were still staring at her.

"Good God," stuttered Snape. "What was that?"

"Fred, let's get Ginny to the hospital wing," said Mr. Weasley. Fred was staring at Pansy.

"That was hot," he said to Pansy, who blushed.

"FRED," said Mr. Weasley again, exasperated.

"Oh, right," said Fred, pulling Ginny off the ground.

"Hey!" said Icicle, one of the followers. Fred pulled out his wand and pointed it at her.

"Don't try me, Hufflepuff," the red-haired man said. Icicle backed away.

"We've got to do something about this, Harry," said a tired looking Arthur Weasley as Harry trailed after them to the hospital wing. "My entire family is falling apart."

They pulled the girl through the doors and Madam Pomfrey rolled her eyes.

"Pretty soon people are going to start showing up to take their kids home, Minister," said the woman. "Stuff like this can't stay secret forever."

The doors opened again and Pansy came in, followed by Snape, McGonagall, and Lupin.

"Someone should have mentioned that," said Snape.

"Well I couldn't really mention it if I didn't know," said Pansy, tossing her hair back in a haughty way that was probably all a show for Fred. Fred noticed.

"What's going on?" asked Harry, addressing McGonagall. He didn't like to look Snape in the eye.

"Miss Parkinson is a Warlock, Mr. Potter," she said. She looked as if she had aged a thousand years in two months.

Harry had heard the term before, but he wasn't entirely sure what a Warlock was.

"What's a Warlock?" he asked. Snape rolled his eyes, as if Harry was the dumbest person he'd ever met.

"A Warlock is a different sort of magician," said Mr. Weasley, inspecting his daughter carefully. "Their magic is a bit...darker than our kind of magic."

"What does that mean?" asked Harry.

"It means that a Warlock's magic is tied to demonic magic," said Snape in a bored voice. Harry was annoyed by Snape's lack of care, and then wondered if he ever got excited; this thought lead to another and he had a horrible mental image. Harry suddenly wished he had some kind of handgun to smother the image out of his brain with.

"Christ," said Pansy. "You make me sound like the anti-Christ."

"A Warlock has a similar degree of power that is like a demon's, Miss Parkinson," said McGonagall. "It doesn't mean you have to be evil."

"Hmph," she said, bored. "So, can I go now?"

Harry marveled at her ability to get over things. A month ago she was muttering things to herself and ripping the hair off of a defenseless toy, and now she was completely calm. Fred was still staring at her, and Harry hoped this didn't lead to what he thought it would.

"Oh, whatever," said McGonagall. "I've lost control over everything..."

"Thanks," said Pansy, and she walked out the door.

"I...um, need a glass of water," said Fred, and he ran out the door.

Mr. Weasley rolled his eyes.

"Right, Harry," said Lupin. "I think your assistance is needed—"

"Professor," he said. "I need to talk to you."

Lupin sighed, but didn't look entirely surprised. He led the boy out the door, and they closed it sharply after them.

"Right, so, what's this about?"

"I want to find her," said Harry. "Ron too. I want him to come with me, and we're going to go find her."

Lupin sighed.

"Harry, it's not safe for two teenagers to run off—"

"I've fought Voldemort more than anyone," said Harry angrily. "And now he has one of my best friends. I want to find her—"

"Harry, please," said Lupin. "The Order—"

"Harry!" said Luna, sprinting toward him. "We've searched everywhere, Harry—he's gone!"

"Who's gone?" asked Harry, although he was sure he knew the answer.

"Ron!" said Luna. "He's gone! He left this."

She pulled a piece of parchment out of her pocket, and Harry grabbed it. Lupin had already disappeared through the door.

_Dear Harry,_

_I'm sorry I didn't tell you,_

_but it was a last minute decision_

_and I've got to leave now_

_or I know I'll never have the courage to go. I'm sorry._

_-Ron_

Harry looked up at Luna, and she was giving me a pitying look. He knew that Ron was gone, and there was no telling where he was.


	15. Teenagers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> some teenagers being teenagers...

It was July. Hermione and Ron were not God-knows-where, Ginny was not possessed by Voldemort, and Dumbledore still had six more days to live.  
Harry Potter was safe at his Aunt and Uncle's house in Surrey, but Hermione and Ron were hiding out together at Grimmauld place. They were sitting on his bed, playing a game of wizard chess, and Ron, for once, was losing.

He wasn't doing it on purpose, but for some reason he couldn't get his mind off of other things.

Hermione moved.

_I know Mum's down in the kitchen cleaning up after dinner, and she'll take the back stairs up to bed, thought Ron._

"Aha," said Hermione. "What's the matter with you today, Ron? You never lose wizard's chess."

_Dad's at the Ministry, and he won't be back until midnight, probably,_ thought Ron. "Oh yeah…I'm just distracted, I suppose."

"Hmmm," said Hermione. She moved again, and one of her knights destroyed another pawn.

_Fred and George are in town_, thought Ron. "When do you reckon Dumbledore will come let Harry stay?" he asked out loud.

"Soon, I guess," said Hermione, inspecting her players. "It feels like a long time since we've seen him."

The reality was that Hermione and Ron had little to talk about when Harry was not around. Hermione, as always, had Ginny to talk to, but Ron had close to no one. It had always been this way, however, because Fred and George had never been keen on letting him in on their schemes and Percy was just plain boring.

"Hermione?" asked Ron. It had been a boring summer for both of them; Ginny had been extra moody. "What'd you suppose Harry will say when he gets back? You know—about Sirius and all?"

She shrugged. "Who knows?"

Moody, Lupin, and Tonks all left this morning, thought Ron. Why am I thinking this? thought Ron. Who cares?

But in reality, Hermione was thinking along the same lines.

_Ginny's asleep_, she thought. _Mrs. Weasley's the only problem; she might come up the stairs to leave laundry in here or something._

Hermione was way better at thinking about two things at once, which is why she was winning.

"I hope he's not so moody," said Ron. "Always yelling at us and everything."

"Give him a break, Ron," Hermione bossed. "He's had a difficult life."

"I still don't see why he should take it out on us," Ron argued. "We know it's been difficult, but we believe him and we've always been there for him. Last year he was worse than a pregnant woman on steroids, always yelling at everything and hitting things—"

"He was attacked by Voldemort, Ronald," said Hermione. Ron noted the use of his full name—Hermione only did that when she was annoyed with him. "And watched Cedric die—"

"Well, I'm just saying!" said Ron. "The two of us have just as good of a chance of dying in this war; he shouldn't take it out on us."

"Whatever," she said, and her queen knocked out his knight. Mr. Weasley's at the Ministry; he won't be back until midnight, she thought.

"What has Ginny's problem been?" asked Ron. "She started an argument with mum yesterday for no reason."

"She's upset about Dean," said Hermione stiffly. She was still sore about their argument a few seconds before. "She's afraid that he's cheating on her."

"How could he do that?" Ron wondered aloud. "He lives at least six miles from everything."

Hermione shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe she's being paranoid."

"I guess," thought Ron.

_Ginny's in her room, asleep,_ thought Hermione. _Lupin, Tonks, and Moody left this morning._

"What's the matter with you today?" Hermione asked him. "You're losing terribly. You're not letting me win, are you?"

"No," said Ron. "I'm just—my mind is somewhere else. I was thinking."

"Oh," said Hermione, wondering what he was thinking about. "Well stop it, because you're losing terri—"

But Hermione's words were cut off, because Ron was very suddenly and very violently kissing her. It took her a moment to process this, and then she was kissing him too, and they were kissing each other, and somehow the wizard chess was no longer in between them and Harry was the farthest thing from both of their minds.

Mrs. Weasley, however, had not taken the back stairs up to bed, and was lugging a huge basket of laundry up towards the smaller bedrooms. Ginny, as always, was in her room, but Mrs. Weasley couldn't figure out what happened to Hermione.

Hermione and Ron both heard a footstep creak the old floorboard outside Ron's room.

"Bloody hell," whispered Ron. They were both very out of breath.

"Ouch," said Hermione, pulling herself out from underneath Ron. She tossed herself under the bed, where she gasped at a large, old, broken statue of a gargoyle.

"Shhh…" hissed Ron.

Molly Weasley came into the room, looking stressed.

"Did you know that there's a painting of Sirius and his brother out in the hallway?" asked Mrs. Weasley cheerily. "I thought all the pictures of Sirius were taken down. I brought your laundr—how did your chess set get all over the place?"

She was staring at the scattered pieces.

"Oh, erm…Hermione got mad at me, and she hit it, and it went everywhere," said Ron quickly.

"I see," said Molly disapprovingly. "Well, pick it up. I'm going to leave this by your wardrobe."

Ron jumped off the bed and carefully collected all the pieces. While he was crouching, he accidentally caught Hermione's eye and they both blushed.

"Alright then," said Molly. "I'm going to bed; your father shouldn't be in until late. If you see Hermione, tell her not to throw things."

Molly Weasley kissed him on the cheek and patted the top of his head. With a snap, the door closed.

"Fantastic, Ron," said Hermione from under the bed. "Now she thinks I throw things."

"Well, would you prefer she know the truth?" asked Ron, pulling her up.

Hermione's face was very red. "No," she said shortly. "I'm going to go to bed," she said coldly, and started to walk towards the door.

Ron grabbed her arm and pulled her back toward him and they we kissing each other again. It was the sort of display that would have made Harry sick, but this is natural, because it was his two best friends. Ginny, being the smart girl that she was, knew exactly what was going on, and was greatly disturbed. She was a very light sleeper, and she knew that Hermione suddenly showing up at three in the morning could only mean one horrible, disgusting thing. She couldn't, however, say that she was really surprised.

Miles and miles away, someone was rapping on Harry Potter's door.

The Boy Who Lived sat up in his bed, endlessly tired, grumbling, and hungry.

"What?" he spat at the door impatiently.

His aunt and uncle slid into the room, looking angry. Aunt Petunia hadn't seen Harry's room in weeks, and she looked completely horrified.

"There's someone at the door," said Uncle Vernon pompously, although there was an obvious fear tingeing in his voice. "We thought you should get it."

Harry squinted at the clock. It was only 3:30, so he guessed that Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon thought only his kind would show up at that time of the night. In reality, he hadn't been expecting anyone and he didn't know who it was now.

"Right, fine, I'll get it," said Harry. It was ridiculous that he was braver at sixteen than the both of them at forty-something years old. Actually, he wasn't entirely sure he knew how old either of them were. He grabbed his wand and slid down the stairs as quietly as he could.

Harry held is wand out nervously and swung the door open. He didn't think Voldemort would stroll right up to his Aunt's house, but he was wary nonetheless.

"No need for that, Potter," said a growling voice. It was Moody.

"Moody?" Harry asked. "Is that you?"

"Of course it is," said Moody, and he strolled right into the house. He couldn't have been more out of place.

Upstairs, Harry heard Petunia gasp at his appearance.

"Better get your things ready, Potter," said Moody. "I'm taking you to the Order. Lupin will be here in a few seconds, and we'll accompany you."

Harry wasn't entirely sure he should trust this Moody. He had, after all, been tricked before.

"Well, get a move on," said Moody. "What's the matter? Are you worried it isn't me?"

Harry said nothing.

"Here, ask me a question only I would know," growled the man.

Harry thought for a moment.

"What's the shrieking painting's name?" asked Harry blandly.

"Ah," said Moody. "Old Mrs. Black."

Harry was comfortable with this answer and ran back up the stairs to collect his things from their scattered places all about the room. He packed quickly, hoping he had everything, and ran back down the stairs to where Moody was still standing.

There was another rap on the door. Harry answered it, and was happy to find Lupin.

"Everything ready, then?" asked Lupin. "Alright, let's get a move on."

The three men walked into the street and Harry grabbed onto Moody's arm. They apparated out, and suddenly they were standing at Number 12, Gimmauld Place.

"Lupin?" asked Harry. "Why did you come so late?"

"Had to, Harry," said the man. "It had to be random. Moody and I only decided on it tonight."

"Oh."

Harry collected his things and went upstairs. He went into his room at Grimmauld place and lay down on his bed, falling asleep instantly.


	16. Icicle's Secret

Harry left the Hospital Wing and walked back toward the tower in something like a daze. He barely noticed anyone, even though a good number of people were pointing at him.

"Harry!" someone was calling. "Harry!"

Harry turned. Surprisingly, it was Ginny.

"Where's Ron?" she asked as she approached him, gasping for breath.

"I—I don't know," said Harry, amazed that Ginny was even speaking to him. As it was, her eyes looked a little better and she wasn't being followed by Icicle or Crabbe.

"What happened? Dad's saying all this stuff about him running away."

"He left to find Hermione," Harry said in a softer voice. He continued to walk down the hallway, attempting to keep everyone out of their conversation.

"But dad said he left you a letter," said Ginny. "Why didn't he wait for you?"

"Frange Femur," Harry told the fat lady. She waved them inside. "He did leave me a letter, and he said he was going to wait for me, but decided against it—"

"What?" asked Ginny, looking crestfallen. "He left without you? How on Earth could he think that was a good idea?"

"I don't know, " said Harry, jumping up the stairs. Ginny followed. He walked into the dormitory, and they both turned toward Ron's side of the room—it was deserted.

"I guess he's really gone," said Ginny softly. "How could he just escape from the castle like that? Why didn't anyone catch him?"

"I don't know," said Harry. For now Hermione, Ron, Neville and Ginny (at times) were all somewhere else.

"Hey," said Seamus, walking into the room. "Whoa," he said, spotting Ron's bed. "Where's Ron?"

"Gone," said Ginny.

Seamus frowned. "So that's Neville—who's evil—Dean—who's afraid to come near you, Harry, so he's been sleeping in the fifth years room—and Ron—who has suddenly decided he wants to become an auror, I guess," said Seamus with a sigh. "Looks like it's just you and me until Saturday, then, Harry."

"What?" asked Harry. "Where are you going on Saturday?"

"Oh, right...I didn't tell you. I'm going home," said Seamus, turning a little red. "My mum heard a bit of gossip and she thinks I'd be better back in Ireland with her."

Harry and Ginny stared at him.

"Well, I didn't want to go," said Seamus. "I wanted to stay, but you know how it is..."

"Not really," said Harry.

Ginny shot him a look.

"Well, it looks like you're going to have the room to yourself," said Ginny. "That'll be fun, won't it?" she added with a weak smile.

"Right, it'll be great," said Harry, flopping down on his bed. Seamus and Ginny looked at each other.

"Well," said Seamus nervously. "I need to get to the Library, Lavender's waiting for me."

He departed quickly.

"I'm going downstairs to read, Harry," said Ginny. "If you need anything—?"

"Yeah, yeah, I know where to find you," said Harry, and rolled over onto his side, blocking her from view.

"Harry," someone was saying as they patted his shoulder.

Harry wrenched himself out of sleep.

"Whozther?" Harry replied groggily. He rolled over a bit, trying to adjust his glasses.

"Harry, you've missed Potions, Charms, and lunch," said Luna, giving him a disapproving look. "Severus told me to come wake you up before you fail everything in one sweep."

"God, Luna," said Harry. "You do realize how weird that is, don't you?"

"Stay out of my love life," she added with a growl. "I don't tell you who to shag, do I?"

Harry shuddered and pulled himself out of bed.

"As of now," he said, pulling his robes. "I don't shag anyone."

"Yes, well, we all have our problems, don't we?" she asked, collecting his books off the floor. "Do you realize that you've been asleep for about thirteen hours?"

"Yeah, well," said Harry. "I was tired."

"Apparently," she said, shoving his books in his hands. "Get to class."

"Stop acting like my mother," said Harry without thinking. Truthfully, if he did have a mother, Luna was kind of acting how he thought one would.

"Get on with it," she said quietly, shoving him out the door.

Harry walked down the hallway and gave any person who shot him a pity smile a glare. He knew it was mean, but he'd forgotten to care.

"Harry," said Professor McGonagall cheerfully as she passed him in the hall. "So good to see you awake."

"Thanks, Professor," Harry replied just as cheerfully. Seeing Ginny back to normal had made his day a lot better, in spite of the fact that Ron had decided to play the hero again.

"I have some make up work for you, when you have the time..." she said, and kept walking.

Harry went to class.

That night in the Great Hall, Luna, Ginny, Seamus, and Lavender Brown all sat with him and talked.

"Well...I don't know," said Ginny, when they asked about her condition. "I was reading, and I sort of just...snapped out of it."

"What were you reading?" asked Harry.

"Well..." she trailed off, turning a little pink. "It was this weird book by this squib named Josephine something. Actually, it mentioned you, Harry..."

"Really?" asked Harry, a little less than surprised.

"When's your mum going to be here?" Lavender asked Seamus.

"Tomorrow at 9," said Seamus. "I told her to come later, but she wanted to show up early."

Lavender frowned and started to cover his face in what Harry would consider to be obnoxious kisses, as Seamus could no longer finish his meal.

"Hopefully I'll convince her to let me come back," said Seamus as well as he could. Ginny rolled her eyes.

"Ginny?" asked Icicle, suddenly appearing behind the redhead.

"WHAT?" snapped Ginny.

"Could I, um...talk to you for a minute?" the blonde asked nervously.

Ginny got up from the table and followed the girl reluctantly. They stood a little while away and Icicle talked to Ginny, who had her arms folded in front of her chest and was glaring in an intimidating way. Suddenly, Harry noticed that Icicle had started to cry, and soon the girl was blubbering like a little girl.

"What was that all about?" asked Luna, following Icicle's form with her eyes. The Hufflepuff sat back down at her own table.

"Well, apparently Draco's been seduced," said Ginny calmly.

Harry choked on his chicken.

"Wha—?" Harry sputtered.

"Yeah," said Ginny, nodding her head. "Icicle just told me that she caught Draco with that Slytherin beater, Alex, in...um—a compromising position."

Harry shook his head. "I knew she was trouble," he said, shaking his head.

Ginny nodded, and ate some of her soup.

"So why was she telling you?" asked Lavender, glaring at the Hufflepuff table.

"Apparently we're friends on my bad days," said Ginny, rolling her eyes. "I pick some interesting people to hang out with. I mean—I do feel bad for her and all, but she kind of deserves it."

"Why?" asked Harry.

"Because Draco was obviously a skirt," said the redhead with a chuckle.

They rest of their little group stared.

"What? What is a skirt?"

"Well..." said Ginny, turning a little red. "She's, um—not really, um—she swings the other direction, if you know what I mean."

They kept staring. Suddenly, Luna's eyes went wide.

"OH!" she said, slapping her hand over her mouth.

"See what I mean?" asked Ginny, grateful that someone understood her cryptic clues.

"What?" asked Seamus and Harry at the same time.

"Well," said Luna, hiding herself behind a copy of the Quibbler. "I guess that would mean that, um...Icicle's a bit of a lesbian."

Harry felt his entire face immediately turn beat red.

"She what?" asked Seamus, looking a little impressed. Lavender's face was green, and she was suddenly avoiding looking at the Hufflepuff table.

"Well, I've known since the beginning of the year," Ginny added nonchalantly. "I mean...it's a little hard not to notice."

"None of us noticed," Harry pointed out.

"Well, that's not what I meant," said Ginny. "I mean, it was a little hard for me not to notice."

"Why?" asked Luna. "What'd she do?"

"Where do I start?" the redhead asked. "I can't even number the times I've caught her staring at me; in class, after class, in the library, during quidditch...right now. No! No! Don't look!"

They turned anyway, and, sure enough, Icicle was staring at her. The blonde blushed and turned away.

"How can you tell during quidditch?" Seamus asked.

"Well, I can't tell if she's staring or not (although she probably is), but every time I fly past, she screams out my name," said Ginny.

Seamus choked back his laughter. "She screams out your name?"

"Shut up," she said with a warning glare.

"Whatever," said Harry. He looked over at the Hufflepuff table where Icicle was sitting, still staring. He glared at her and she looked away quickly.

"So, if Icicle's a lesbian, how come she cares that Draco was cheating on her?" asked Harry.

"Well, I would have thought that'd be obvious, Harry," Ginny said.

Seamus and Harry glanced at each other, but Luna nodded.

"Well...enlighten us," Seamus said, rolling his eyes so Harry could see.

"She's afraid everyone will figure her out," said Luna knowingly. "Obviously. Now that Draco has another girl, she's afraid that he'll tell her that Icicle was as cold as an old dead fish and everyone will put two and two together—that is, the cold dead fish thing and all the Ginny-staring."

"Oh," said both Seamus and Harry. Both boys wondered silently to themselves if they should have been able to figure this out.

"I didn't pick up on it," said Lavender. "But I guess I should have."

"Harry?" asked Ginny. "Can I ask you a question?"

"Yeah..." he said slowly, suddenly fearful.

"Can you, by any chance, tell me anything about that tramp, Pansy Parkinson and a certain brother of mine?" Ginny asked viciously.

Lavender sat up. "Pansy and Ron?" she asked eagerly.

"No," said Ginny. "The other one."

"Fred," said Harry. "Yeah. I don't know if anything actually happened, but he seemed kind of interested in her...and she didn't seem all that upset about it."

"Fred is into Pansy?" Lavender asked. "How did that happen?"

"Yesterday after you and Pansy had your little...argument, Pansy was brought into the Hospital Wing with Snape and McGonagall, and Fred followed her right back out again," said Harry. "She didn't really discourage him."

"Fantastic," said Ginny. "We're going to have some crazy-bitch warlock in the family."

Seamus and Lavender laughed. Luna shook her head.

"Warlocks aren't all that bad, Ginny," said the blonde girl.

"I wonder where Hermione is," Harry wondered out loud.

Harry didn't know this, but miles and miles away, Hermione was sitting in a room on a rickety old bed.

"GET ME A BOOK NOW!" she was screaming. The Death Eater in the corner was nodding a shaky "OK" and was crying softly.

"I don't know," said Luna, still in the Great Hall.

"Yeah," said Lavender. "I don't know. But...they wouldn't hurt her or anything, though. Would they...?"

"I don't know," said Ginny. "I wonder where Ron is."

"Apparating all over the place, probably," said Harry. "I wish he had waited for me."

"I do too," said Ginny. "I love Ron, but I'd feel a lot better if you were out there helping him. He's not a terrible guy or anything, but you have a lot more experience dealing with Death Eaters and Voldemort and everything."

"Yeah," said Luna. "He should have waited for you."

"Well, I don't know how long the both of us will be here anyway," said Ginny, rubbing her stomach absentmindedly.

He caught her eyes, and they stared at each other for a moment. Harry was getting an odd, prickly feeling on the back of his neck and in his stomach.

"Well, I'm going to bed," said Luna.

"Me too," said Lavender. "I'll see you off in the morning, Shames."

Harry giggled a little at this new nickname and Seamus turned, glaring at him.

"Ok," said Seamus. They started to snog again, and Ginny rolled her eyes at them. "Good night," said the Irish boy, and Lavender walked away.

"I'm going to find Dean," said Seamus. "Say goodbye, and everything. See you in the dormitory, Harry."

Seamus left as well, and Harry was left sitting awkwardly across from Ginny, who was still patting her stomach.

"Well," said Ginny. "I don't know how much longer I'm going to be sane...so I'm going to enjoy it while I have the time. "

She shot him a bitter smile.

"Bye," she said, and ruffled his hair as she stood up and walked away. Harry watched her, and tried to flatten it back down.


	17. Accio Clothes!

"AWWLRIAGHT," said Rebekah, drunk on firewhiskey in the common room the next day with her Slytherin cousin, Alex.

They burst into hysterical giggles.

"AWWWLLRIAGHT!" screamed Alex, and they laughed some more. Harry sat across the room, watching them with a smirk. The more drunk they were, the worse their Texan accents became; normally they pretended to be British with excellent fake accents.

"Hey," said Harry. "Maybe you should give the firewhiskey a rest. Don't you have Ancient Runes in like an hour?"

"Anchtient what?" slurred Rebekah.

"Nevermind," said Harry. "Maybe you two should go sleep it off."

"Whooooot," said Alex, tipping over. "Sleep it offff."

"REMEMBENER THE ALAMO!" Rebekah screamed, throwing up her hand in triumph.

"ALL HAIL SANTA ANNTA!" Alex screamed back.

"No," said Rebekah. "He was the one who killed the Alamo."

"Oh," said Alex, taking a swig.

"Hey, Harry," said Ginny, coming through the door. "I need you to help me with" –

She glanced at Alex and Rebekah, who were dancing to something called 'My Hump' – "I need you to find something for me," she said, dropping a book on the table.

Harry glanced at the book, hoping this had nothing to do with him reading it.

"What do you need me to find?" he asked, looking away from it.

"I need you to see if you can convince Madam Pince to let you check out a book called Evil Locations in Southern Britain," she said. "I would check it out myself, but I've already forged all my teachers names at least twice, and I'm scared I'll get caught if I do it again."

"What have you been checking out from the library?" he asked.

"Nothing," she said, automatically defensive. "None of your business, thank you very much," she spat, and walked away. In her huff, she forgot her book; Harry picked it up and looked at the cover.

"HARRY POTTER AND THE HALF-BLOOD WHAT?"

"Prince!" said Rebekah in a sing-song voice from across the room. "Soooo good."

She and Alex laughed.

"SERIOUSLY SHUT UP!" he yelled. A couple of the first years in the room cowered, and Harry opened to read the jacket.

With a look of utter confusion, he put it back down and shook his head.

"Fight and flirt and fall in love? How does this person know so much about me?"

"She's stalking you," said Alex, laughing.

Harry looked furtively back and forth, frightened. Alex and Rebekah laughed again.

Exasperated, he got up and left the room, heading, he guessed, for the library.

"Madam Pince," he said, arriving. "I need a book out of the restricted section."

Being in the OWL class, he didn't need a note signed by any of his professors. Madam Pince looked at him suspiciously anyway.

"That Ginny Weasley send you?"

Harry jumped.

"N-no," Harry stuttered. The old librarian narrowed her eyes.

"Hmmm. Well, what do you need?"

"Evil Locations in Southern Britain."

She narrowed her eyes even more. "Alright then," said Madam Pince, and Harry heard Alex and Rebekah going "AWWWLRIAAGHT," in his head. He choked back laughter and the librarian glared.

A few Ravenclaws at the table next to them gave him the look of death.

"Here it is," she said, nearly shoving him out of the restricted section.

"Thanks," he said, a little annoyed. Harry loved the restricted section. He wanted to get married in the restricted section.

He tried to track down Ginny, but she was no where to be found. The Great Hall was nearly empty, but the courtyard was packed.

"Hey Lavender," said Harry, coming up behind her. "Have you seen Ginny?"

"Nope," she said, shrugging. "I haven't seen her. You might try the Hospital Wing thought, I saw her mother going in there."

"Oh," said Harry. "Thanks."

Harry sprinted down the hallway toward the Hospital Wing with the book still in his hand, wondering if Mrs. Weasley would care if he was carrying around something about evil locations.

"Harry," said Fred, leaning against the door in a way that was awfully smug. He noticed Pansy suddenly next to him, and jumped. "You're looking well."

"Uh..." said Harry, not really sure what to say. Pansy was smirking at him, somewhat amused. "Um, hi Fred, Pansy."

"You'd better not go in there," said Fred, nodding toward the door. "It's pretty messy."

Harry glanced nervously at the door.

"Oh," said the black-haired boy, backing away from it. "I guess I'll come back—"

"I HATE YOU!" Ginny screeched, bursting through the door. "I HATE YOU I HATE YOU I HATE YOU I HATE YOU I HATE YOU!"

"Ginny, please, listen to reason," said Mrs. Weasley. "There's no other way and I need you to—"

"NO!"

Pansy and Fred backed away from the door and Mrs. Weasley slid through, very pale.

"Ginny—"

"GET AWAY FROM ME!"

She disappeared down the hallway.

"Fred," said Mr. Weasley, coming into view. "What in the name—"

"Hello Mr. Weasley," said Pansy, beaming. Mr. Weasley stared at her blankly.

"Is there something wrong dad?" asked Fred, nodding toward Ginny's disappearing figure.

"No, no," said Mr. Weasley. "We'll take care of it."

Immediately, Mr. Weasley, Mrs. Weasley, Fred, and Pansy all looked at Harry.

"What?" he asked. "Ohhhh no!"

He tried to run.

"Harry please," said Mrs. Weasley. "You know how she is. If there's anyone she'll listen to, it's you."

"Where's Ron and Hermione, eh? Who's doing anything about that? Ginny and I should be out there looking for them and we're not—"

"Well, we can't possibly let you leave, Harry," said Mrs. Weasley. "That's insane—"

"Whatever," said Harry. "What do you want."

"Try to get her to come home," said Mrs. Weasley, pleading. "She refuses to leave—"

"Well...I don't really blame her," said Harry.

They stared at him.

"What?" said Mr. Weasley.

"It's safer here, isn't it?"

"What about what happened to Hermione and Ron?" Mrs. Weasley screeched.

"That was Neville's fault," said Harry. They stared at him, desperate. "Oh, alright. Fine. I'll try, but I'm not promising anything."

Harry turned and walked down the hallway, rolling his eyes.

"Hi Harry," said Lavender, dotting her i's with little hearts on a letter to Seamus in the Gryffindor Common Room.

"Hi," he said. "Have you seen Ginny?"

Lavender pointed darkly at the girls' steps.

Harry walked over toward it and looked up the dark stairway.

"Ginny?" he asked.

"That's never going to work," said Parvati. "She's not coming down."

"Why not?" he asked, turning toward her.

"She's pretty mad," said Parvati with a shrug. "What do you need?"

"I need to talk to her," said Harry, and Parvati gave her a dark look. "Don't look at me that way, I don't think she should leave either. I just need to...tell her to humor her mother a little bit, even if she's not going to leave. That's all, I promise."

"Yeah, well—alright. Look; don't tell any of the other guys this or anything, but what a lot of people don't know is that if a boy, such as yourself, was to follow a girl, like me, up the stairs very closely they won't collapse."

Harry gave her a doubtful look.

"I'm serious," she said. "But it only works if you follow, and you'll have to get off the stairs before I do or they will fall."

"Ok," said Harry, studying the stairs.

"So are you following?" she asked, giving him a quizzical look.

"Sure," he said, hoping that she wasn't making it up.

Parvati immediately started up the stairs. Harry jumped after her, praying for a miracle he wasn't sure was going to come. To his great astonishment, nothing happened and he was paused dumbly on the second step.

"Ok," said Parvati, stopping somewhere a lot higher than where Harry's dormitory was in the tower. "This is the fifth year's dormitory; unfortunately I have to go to the library, so you're going to have to find someone else to lead you back down if you don't like falling—a lot. Good luck!"

Harry jumped through the door in what was probably a very foolish way, had he known anything about girls, but luckily everything was safe.

"What's he doing in here?" asked some girl in Gryffindor that Harry'd never met.

"Damn," said Ginny, rolling her eyes. "I'm going to kill Parvati."

"ACK!" said Romilda Vane, seeing him, and she fell backwards off her bed.

"Hello Harry," said Luna, beaming at him. "Having a good day? Do you need a moment?"

She glanced at Ginny, and Ginny glared at him.

"Uh, yeah," said Harry.

Romilda Vane, very red in the face (having fallen so) looked as if leaving Harry in a room alone with Ginny was the last thing she wanted to do.

"Fine," Ginny barked. "MAKE IT QUICK."

Harry shuddered, wishing his witnesses didn't have to leave the room.

Luna pulled Romilda out of the room and closed the door with a little wink to Harry behind Ginny's back.

"So," said Ginny. "My mother has you as her little errand boy now?"

Harry fumed. "I'm not an errand boy," he said in a childish way. "For your information, I happen to agree with y—"

"I'm not going," said Ginny with audible force.

"I don't want you to d—"

"Neither you nor my mother can make me do anything," she said, nervously tugging on her shirt.

The shirt.

"Hey!" shouted Harry, suddenly recognizing it. "That's mine! You stole that out of my room!"

And indeed she had. Harry had forgotten about that particular incident, believing it to be Ron's.

Ginny turned pink.

"Yeah, well..." she sputtered nervously. "I liked it."

"I liked it too!" he said. "You didn't have to steal it."

Her eyes narrowed. Quite suddenly, she did something that Harry wasn't entirely prepared for.

"Fine," the redhead spat, simultaneously speaking, stumbling angrily out of her bed, and, to Harry's utter bewilderment, taking off her shirt (or his, if you feel like being literal). She slid noisily to her bare feet, swearing, and threw it at him.

They stood face to face for a moment, neither able to understand what had just taken place for a second or two. Harry's jaw was hanging dumbly and his arms were still suspended in mid-air, frozen. Ginny had her hands on her hips and seemed defiant for a moment, but slowly (as her cheeks attested) she started to comprehend what she had just done.

Oh-my-God! She thought. Oh-my-God! WHAT DID I JUST DO! I'm standing in a room in a bra right in front of my brother's best friend! OH-MY-GOD!

Oh God, thought Harry. She's wearing a black bra. NO NO NO NO DON'T THINK THAT!

Walk to the wardrobe, thought Ginny. Slowly—she started towards it—be calm, be calm, go slow, act like you meant to do that! NO SLOWER THAN THAT!

Ginny did her best to breathe normally and walk slowly, but it wasn't really working out. She made it to the wardrobe pretty well, but her hands were shaking so badly as she searched for another shirt that anything she touched seemed to slip through her fingers.  
Behind her, Harry was looking at the wall.

What's the deal? thought a mean part of his brain. Her back is turned. If you look, she wouldn't know – NO! STOP IT!

Soon, however, it didn't really whether or not he was looking because he was heading straight for her.

"Wha?" Ginny tried as she felt Harry grab her and spin her toward him, but her words were cut short because Harry's mouth was now firmly attached to her own. Ginny, intelligent girl that she was, was still not entirely prepared for this so they both stumbled backwards as she lost her balance in the excitement of everything. They tumbled into the wardrobe, and it tipped backward and hit the wall with a smack.

Harry and Ginny furiously fought to free themselves from her clothing. Harry pulled back first, gasping for breath. Ginny resurfaced second, saw Harry, and immediately grabbed him. She roughly attacked him via the mouth.

Several messy minutes passed and Ginny directed Harry toward the place where she sleeps. If Harry had been paying attention (which was difficult, considering how both were fighting to be on top of each other), he would have heard two loud, gossiping teenagers walking up the stairs.

"Voldemort can't stop the rock," sang Rebekah.

"Ooh ooh oohhhh! VOLDEMORT AGAINST THE ROCK ON CELEBRITY DEATH MATCH!"

"YES! Wait a minute, what was I talking about?"

"So then the other one—"

"Heath?" asked Alex.

"Yeah, that one," said Rebekah. "He looks around at the other cowboy and suddenly—"

They stopped, catching Harry and Ginny as they walked through the door.

"Whoa," said Rebekah.

"Damn," said Alex. "Why'd you have to wait until Ron left? I could have had fun with this!"

Rebekah shook her head and rocked with silent laughter. Both girls were still kind of drunk.

Harry did the only thing he could think to do at the moment.

"ACCIO CLOTHES!"

Both girls burst out laughing.

Harry and Ginny/Harry's shirt flew toward them.

"Get out!" shouted Ginny, pulling herself the rest of the way out from under Harry and they both wrestled with their clothing.

"Where's my camera?" asked Alex. Harry tried to calm his hair, which Ginny had done a good job messing up.

"Right, right, we're going," said Rebekah. "We'll tell the kids downstairs to steer clear, eh?"

They disappeared with a snap.

The next few seconds that followed were some of the worst Harry'd ever experienced. They both had their shirts back, and Ginny was sitting on the bed with her legs crossed, twirling her thumbs.

"Maybe you should follow them," said Ginny. "You know, keep them quiet a bit."

"Uh," said Harry. "Yeah."

"That way, you know, no more gossip. Just to make sure..."

Harry walked toward the door and almost walked through, but he remembered just as he put his hand on the doorknob.

"You'll have to walk down first," said Harry. "So I don't fall."

He glanced at her, and blushed scarlet. She did the same.

"Oh, alright," she said, and she slid off the bed as well.

They both knew it was going to happen, but they didn't entirely believe it; as soon as Ginny reached the door they were kissing each other again.

"We should talk later," said Ginny, gasping for breath.

"Yeah," said Harry, nodding fervently. "My room?" he asked. "Everyone's gone. Privacy, you know. No eavesdroppers."

"Sure," she said. "I'll...be around by 8."

"Ok," he said, and opened the door for her. They walked down the stairs, wearing completely innocent expressions, secretly smirking behind their stories.


	18. Ginny's Rejection

Harry was in good spirits the rest of the day; Draco couldn't spoil his spirits with a "Not dead yet, Potter? That's a shame!"in the hallway, neither could the sight of Fred making out with Pansy Parkinson in the Muggle Studies section of the library. Harry merely smiled, and wondered what Hermione would think if she could see the pair (miles away she said "Someone's done something wrong in the library, I can feel it").

Ron didn't notice, however, because he was preoccupied with being lost somewhere in Holland.

Harry started to notice something was wrong around lunchtime, however, because the Hufflepuffs were all huddled into groups and looking very serious.

"Is something going on?" Harry asked Lavender, who had taken to following him around ever since Seamus left.

"I don't know," said Lavender, reading a letter from Seamus as she wept.

"—A skirt?"

"—Right, he was her Barbie doll!"

"NO WAY!"

"—Yeah, she's been keeping it—"

Harry's stomach did a turn, and he thought he had some idea what they were talking about.

"—Totally used him," said one girl, looking gleeful and mean.

"Are they talking about who I think they're talking about?" asked Lavender, wiping messy mascara off of her face and tucking the letter in the pocket of her robes.

"I think they are," said Harry.

Just at that moment, Draco walked by with his arm over the Slytherin girl who was always invading the Gryffindor Common Room, Alex.

"ONE MORE WORD ABOUT IT AND I'LL HEX YOU!" Draco shouted at a couple of terrified Hufflepuff first years. "Honestly, I didn't even know kids that age knew what lesbianism was."

"You would—I mean, you couldn't tell, could you?"

"Nobody could," said Harry in passing. "Only Ginny did."

"Because she hit on her," said Lavender, defending Draco in an uncharacteristic way.

"What's she going to say now that everyone knows she's a lesbian?" asked Harry, watching the vicious crowd of Hufflepuffs as they gossiped. "She seemed so quiet about it."

"Who told?" wondered Lavender, as Luna suddenly appeared looking sheepish.

"It was my fault," said Luna, looking guilty.

"What?" asked Harry, confused. They lowered their voices and went into the Great Hall for a bite to eat.

"I accidentally told Severus last night," she said, and Harry cringed again. "Honestly Harry, get used to it. Anyway—I was in his office last night—" Harry shivered at the thought of Luna being in Snape's office, alone "—and I accidentally let it slip. Well, you know how those Death Eaters are; they're like old frat buddies. He wrote a letter to Lucius, and Lucius wrote to Draco to see if this was true, but Justin Finch-Fletchley's in the Hogwarts-Azkaban Outreach Association too, and he got the owl on accident—and well, it just all came out this morning. Well...Icicle did, I mean. Everyone knows now."

"How terrible," said Lavender, looking teary-eyed (but probably for a different reason).

"I know," said Luna. "I feel so terrible. I mean, if it hadn't been for me—"

"Well she couldn't keep it a secret forever, Luna," said Harry. "It was bound to come out sooner or later."

"She probably wanted to tell people on her own time, not have some spiteful little prat do it for her," said Luna, feeling glum.

"You know, Luna," said Lavender. "When you think about it, it's not really your fault. I mean—Snape shouldn't have told Lucius, and Lucius should have kept it to himself, and those bloody owls are supposed to be smart enough to realize the difference between a Hufflepuff and a Slytherin."

"That's true," added Harry, eating some cereal.

"Why are you eating cereal, Harry?"

It was Ginny, and she was looking particularly annoyed.

"Nothing," he said, not really hearing her. He was reliving the morning in his mind.

"Nothing? Harry, where is your mind?" asked Ginny, looking amused.

"Hippogriffs," said Harry randomly.

"Wonderful," she said, disregarding him playfully. "Anyway, what's going on?"

"I don't know, Ginny," said Luna. "What is going on?"

"Wait—what?" asked Lavender, confused.

"Did you guys hear about Icicle?" asked Ginny, sitting glumly. "It's all over the hallways."

"I know," said Harry. "We just walked by a bunch of Hufflepuffs who were having a great time with it."

"Ugh, everyone's being so childish," she spat, disgusted.

"Hello Harry."

The entire table screamed.

"GOD! MYRTLE! WHAT?" said Harry, still completely freaked out. "What do you want?"

"I think there's something you should take a look at," she said, sighing. "Not that anyone cares. I mean—no one ever does."

"Myrtle, can you tell me what this is about?" he asked, exasperated.

"I'd have to show you," she said in a sing-song voice. "It's horrible. You'll hate it."

"What is it?"

"Ohhhh," she moaned, and she drifted toward her bathroom.

"Oh for Gandalf's sake," said Harry. "I hope this isn't going where it normally goes."

"See you later," said Luna, still looking glum.

"Myrtle, slow down!"

"I don't know why you're complaining," said Myrtle, floating over some short second-years. "You're the one with legs, after all."

"You have legs," he said, pushing his way through the students as he tried to make his way upstairs.

"Well I can't really use them, can I?" she asked, looking annoyed.

"Myrtle's out of the bathroom?" asked one girl, giving Harry a suspicious look.

"Myrtle, SLOW DOWN!"

"GO FASTER," she said, glaring at him. "This is important. I wasn't in the room when it happened, I was visiting the Fat Friar about my cousin."

"What?"

"And then I got back and I was surprised, but you're the only one I know who would care...who knows where McGonagall is these days, and I don't like that other character with the blonde girlfriend."

"Snape?"

"Sure," she said. "Whatever. They're all the same anyway, those Death Eaters."

"I'll say," he said, coming around the corner where her bathroom was located. She was still up next to the ceiling.

"In here," she said, and she went right through the wall. A second year Ravenclaw gave him an amused look as she watched him go into the girl's bathroom.

"HOLY MOTHER OF ELROND!" he screamed, spotting Myrtle's find. "ICICLE!"

Icicle was laying on the floor, pale and cold as ice. Harry ran over to her side, but it was obvious that he was too late. She was dead.

Myrtle was making a racket with painful sobbing.

"MYRTLE! STOP CRYING! STOP IT!"

He bust through the stall where all the noise was coming from and immediately flew backwards and screamed.

"ARGHHHHHH!"

"Stop it!" said the girl through tears. "You're making me more upset!"

"Icicle," said Harry, flabbergasted. "You! You're—DEAD!"

"OBVIOUSLY," she said. "Seeing as I'm suddenly TRANSPARENT!"

"Why? Why are you—? You're a ghost," he said, still stunned. "How did you—?"

"You didn't look very closely, did you?" asked the girl, pointing at her dead body.

Harry rushed over to her body, and noticed some small wounds on her wrists.

"But these are too small, there's not any blood..."

"GOD NO ONE UNDERSTANDS ME JUST GO AWAY!" She screamed, and Harry hurriedly rushed through the door.

"MCGONAGALL!" he screamed at the top of his lungs. "PROFESSOR MCGONAGALL! WHERE IS PROFESSOR MCGONAGALL?"

Harry shouted all the way down the hallways with no avail, until, finally, six hours later (it seemed) he finally came across the greying witch with a tired Professor Lupin and a grumpy Severus Snape in the front hall.

"Mr. Potter, what is the meaning of th—?"

"Please, Professor," Harry gasped. "You must come see—! In the bathroom—! Killed herself! Nothing I could do! She was already dead!"

"What? Who killed herself?"

"Icicle, from Hufflepuff," said Harry. "Myrtle found her, already gone—cut her wrists!"

"Oh God," said McGonagall, turning to a shocked Lupin and a green-faced Snape. "Show me," she said, and Harry immediately turned on his heel and ran in the other direction.

"Dirty little snitch," said Icicle, sliding through the wall briefly.

"How long did you expect it to stay secret?" asked Harry, and for some unknown reason Icicle burst into a fresh set of tears. McGonagall eyed the girl warily, and went into the bathroom.

"Oh dear," said McGonagall, still eyeing Icicle, who was crying. "Severus, look at this."

The professor held up a potions knife and Snape sniffed it.

"Ah," was all he said.

"I don't get it," said Harry. "They don't look deep enough to kill her."

"They're not," said Lupin, who was also eyeing the knife.

"Icicle, did you, by any chance, forget to wash your potions knife correctly?" asked the greasy-haired man.

If a ghost could turn purple, this is what Icicle would have been doing.

"Perhaps," she squeaked.

"As I thought. There's Batsminch on this knife, Headmaster," said Snape, handing her the knife.

"Ah," said McGonagall. Icicle looked sheepish, as if she'd done something she didn't mean to do.

Harry stayed quiet and didn't ask what "Batsminch" was, because he had a feeling he was supposed to know.

"Batsminch, as well as being very potent and valuable in the making of potions for a number of uses is also very poisonous when used raw or undiluted with Judugas Juice. Did you have potions today, Icicle?"

"Yes," she squeaked.

"You poisoned yourself?" asked Harry, confused.

"BE QUIET!" she said, and disappeared through the floor.

"Well, I suppose we're going to need to alert her parents," said McGonagall with a sigh. "I hate it when they chose to stay behind, you can never get rid of the well-wishers and relatives."

"My parents never come to see me," said Myrtle with a sniff.

They ignored her.

Harry left the bathroom and was flooded with questions as soon as he had reached the Gryffindor Common Room. Many people had seen him running through the corridors in a fervor, and some one from the Quidditch team heard a rumor about a body.

"Is someone dead, Harry? What happened?" everyone was shouting.

"It's—it's Icicle," he said, and everyone's faces went blank. "She poisoned herself."

There was a long moment of stunned silence after Ginny gave a short shriek of surprise.

"She committed suicide?" asked one fourth year, amazed.

"Well..." Harry started. "Sort of."

Everyone in the room blinked.

"What do you mean, 'sort of'?" asked the girl, wary.

"Well...she was in the bathroom," Harry started, nervous. "And, well...you know how she is, she's a little emo, so she was cutting her wrists, but not very deep...and, well...she might have been ok, but she forgot that the knife she was using she'd been using earlier in potions, to cut Batsminch—"

Harry didn't need to explain anything else, because the room went "OH," and cringed.

"That must have been painful," said one boy. "It's really terrible."

"Well, she told me that—" Harry started, but he was interrupted.

"She told you?"

"Well...yeah," said Harry, confused.

"So she's not dead? She's alright?"

"What? OH—NO! She's dead, she's a ghost," and the rest of the class nodded in understanding. "She's in that same bathroom that Myrtle died in."

"What do you think pushed her over the edge?" asked some small girl in the back.

"Nothing," said some other boy. "Didn't you hear? She forgot to wash her Potions knife before she cut herself with it."

"Well yeah, but what lead her to cutting?"

"Bright Eyes?" Rebekah ventured, but the other Gryffindor's didn't know what she was talking about.

"Well, I've got to get to class," said one older Gryffindor.

"Oh, me too," said another student.

"Think they'll cancel classes?" asked someone.

"Doubtful," said someone else.

When Harry looked up, the room was almost bare except three crying first years, a couple of seventh-years with off periods, and Ginny, who was sitting on of the chairs looking remorseful.

Harry caught her eye and motioned for her to follow him upstairs.

"What's wrong?" he asked as he closed the door, and she sat down on Ron's bare bed.

"It's my fault, Harry," she said, one single tear going down her face. "It's all my fault. She told me today that it had gotten out she was a lesbian, and that she—well, that she...liked me. I didn't know what to do—I just told her I wasn't interested and to leave me alone. I should have done something, I should have put her down a little easier..."

"Ginny," said Harry. "The fact that Icicle's dead is her own fault. She shouldn't have been playing around with that sort of thing and she should have remembered that her knife was contaminated."

"I know, Harry, but knowing that doesn't stop me from wondering if maybe—"

"Don't, Gins, don't blame yourself."

Harry crossed the room and started to kiss Ginny with zeal. They were beginning to enjoy themselves when a disturbance suddenly floated through the wall.

"AH-HA!"

Harry and Ginny pulled apart and stared, dazed, at the floating figure before them.

"Icicle," said Ginny, breathless. "I didn't—"

"You could have just told me you were straight, you know," said Icicle, glaring.

"Well...I thought that was obvious, Icicle, I mean...I dated Dean, didn't I?"

"But you were so different before," Icicle groaned. "When you were hanging out with me and Crabbe and Blaise and Goyle. Remember?"

"Not really," she said with an impatient huff.

"Well—fine, whatever. I'm going to go find someplace to set up a permanent residence. Think that Myrtle girl is going to kick me out of the bathroom soon?"

"Probably," said Harry. "Erm...Icicle? Are you going to tell anyone about this?"

Icicle gave Harry and Ginny a long, calculating look. Her eyes flickered back and forth between some evil thought and what might have been mercy, so Harry assumed she was having quite the struggle in her empty head.

"No," she said. "I'll give you a break, I guess. You were never that interested in me anyway, and it's not like we could be together now that I'm dead. That Grey Lady's pretty though, isn't she?" Icicle asked, looking hopeful. "Never mind, don't answer that. I'm leaving."

Harry and Ginny stared at each other, dazed, and continued snogging.


	19. A Christmas Shock

Over the next four weeks, Harry could not keep his mind focused on anything—the only thoughts that entered his mind somehow reminded him of Ginny; when Lavender walked in wearing a blue shirt, Harry thought Ginny has a blue shirt. When Draco walked by with Alex, Harry thought Ginny knows Alex. Christmas was coming along quickly and everyone was making plans to go home; Harry wouldn't (not that the Dursley's would let him if he tried), but Ginny was who he was really wondering about. Mrs. Weasley wanted her to come home, for obvious reasons, but Ginny didn't appear to take any of it.  
So it wasn't a shock to Harry when Ginny raged into his room the Friday before Holiday began swearing at her mother (where ever her mother was), promising never to return home again. Harry just watched until Ginny grabbed him, then they made out in his room for nearly an hour.

Harry and Ginny celebrated this news by making out anywhere they wanted.

First they made out in a dark corner of the library. Then they made out in the Quidditch stands—all over the Slytherin section. Then they made out in the Great Hall in broad daylight. Then, when they were done with that, they made out in a rose bush in the courtyard.

Harry was greeted on Christmas morning by sleeping Ginny breathing in his face. Slowly he pushed her away from him and went downstairs, where there was a tree set up glittering with lights.

"Harry?" asked Ginny, coming out of his room in a daze, rubbing her eyes.

"I don't think you got one, Ginny," said Harry, going through the small pile of presents there.

Ginny came down the stairs and stood next to him.

"Didn't get one of what?" she asked.

"A sweater," he said, pulling an ugly grey bundle of yarn out of a messy roll of wrapping paper.

"Oh," she said, a trace of annoyance flickering in her eyes.

Harry picked up a smaller package with no recipient on it, just a big W on the side and handed it to her.

"I guess that's for you," he said, shrugging. Ginny took it from him and ripped off the paper, slowly, curious.

In her hand was a smaller bundle of ugly red yarn. She held it out.

Harry and Ginny stared at the tiny sweater awkwardly. Suddenly, out of nowhere, she burst into tears.

"Uh," said Harry. "Ginny?"

She latched onto him with a death grip, and sobbed into his shoulder. He patted her arm awkwardly.

"Truly remarkable," said a snobby sounding voice.

"Capital," said another. "Truly capital!"

"Stop saying 'truly'."

"Fabulous!" said the other girl, sounding oddly like McGonagall.

The portrait swung open.

Alex and Rebekah stared at the scene in front of them evilly, grinning.

Click.

Alex snapped a picture of them and disapparated with a crack. She apparated again, camera-less.

Harry and Ginny sprang apart.

"Stop doing that!" Ginny screeched, wiping tears off her face.

"We just thought we should let you two know—seeing as you're suddenly so...how should I put this..." Rebekah tapped her chin with her finger. "Friendly—"

"Hump buddies," said Alex.

"Good one," said Rebekah. "Anyway, that you might want to refrain from the—the—"

"Humping?" asked Alex.

"Well, more or less from all the sex, at least for a little while," Rebekah finished.

"We haven't—" Ginny started.

"Please, Ginny," said Rebekah. "You can't fool us. We're American."

"We know all about the sex," said Alex, nodding.

"Seriously, we weren't—" Harry tried.

"Yeah whatever Potter just give it a rest. Seriously. You might actually try considering what I have to say this time."

She was giving him a look of mild significance, but it was shortly replaced by her usual blank carelessness.

Harry and Ginny stared at them.

"What's all this about?" asked Ginny, giving her a quizzical look.

"Nothing," said Alex and Rebekah at the same time, but neither of them would look at them in the eye.

"So what'd you get?" asked Rebekah, walking up the stairs as soon as she said it. Alex looked in-between the stairs and Harry and ran up after her.

"That was weird," said Ginny, staring after them.

They sat down on the ground and opened the rest of their presents; the ones they bought for Ron and Hermione stayed under the tree for them whenever they decided to return.

When they were finished in the Common Room they went to the Great Hall for breakfast; they didn't know what to do with the rest of the evening (seeing as everyone was gone) so they went to the courtyard to play wizard's chess.

It was late into the evening when they both went back to the Common Room with the intention of doing some of their holiday schoolwork—they ended up, instead, doing dirty things in Ginny's bed.

"Hold on just a second!" someone shouted outside in the stairwell.

"Who's that?" said Ginny, trying to sit up a little.

"Rebekah?" asked Harry.

"Harry?"

The door swung open.

"No don't!" both teenagers shouted at the same time.

"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

"What is it?" called a male voice from downstairs.

Hermione slammed the door and disappeared.


	20. Ron and Hermione Return

"Hermione!" both teenagers shouted. Harry and Ginny made a mad scramble to clean themselves up, put their shirts back on (although Harry accidentally put on Ginny's shirt once) and get themselves picked up enough to be able to go downstairs.

Suddenly, as they were both nearly ready to return—

"HARRY AND GINNY ARE DOING WHAT?" Ron shouted.

Harry cringed.

"HARRY! HARRY I'M GOING TO KILL YOU—!"

"RON! DON'T!" Hermione shouted.

There was a creak and a crash.

"Ow," said Ron.

"Idiot," said Hermione.

Harry and Ginny opened the door and spotted the stairway, which had disappeared into a long slope.

"Ron?" Ginny tried.

"GINNY!" said Ron. "GET DOWN HERE!"

"RON, YOU PRAT, STOP TELLING ME WHAT TO DO!"

"I'm going to kill you, Harry!" Ron called up.

"Ron!" said Harry. "You're back!"

"DON'T ACT ALL HAPPY TO SEE ME YOU HOUND DOG!" Ron shouted. "I LEAVE FOR TEN SECONDS AND YOU START BANGING MY SISTER!"

"RON!" shouted Ginny and Hermione instantly.

"Just a second," Ginny said, suddenly poised to kill. She pulled out her wand.

"Ginny..." said Harry cautiously, attempting to grab the back of her shirt. "Don't do anything you'll regret..."

Harry was now trapped upstairs completely.

"Ron, for the last time—!"

"What is the matter with you? Huh? What is the matter with you? You're acting like some kind of crazy—"

"Crazy what, exactly, Ron? Hm? Answer that sentence and I'll finally be able to try out that Crucio thing Bella's so fond of—!"

"GINNY!" Harry said, stepping onto to the stair instinctively. This was a mistake.

"Argh!" Harry cried, as the staircase creaked and turned into the slope once more.

"There you are you stupid—"

Ron grabbed Harry's shirt collar, called him a few dirty names, pulled him off the ground, and pointed his wand right into Harry's face.

"Ron!" said Hermione, pulling out her own wand.

"DO IT AND I FINISH YOU RON!" Ginny screeched.

"What? You're going to kill your own brother?" Ron shouted at her, indignant.

"And you're going to kill your own best friend?" asked Hermione.

Ron looked back at Harry.

"EXPELLIARMUS!" Hermione shouted, pointing her wand at Ron.

Ron's wand flipped out of his hand and disappeared behind a couch.

"Hey!" said Ron, dropping Harry. He whirled on Hermione, furious.

"You weren't honestly going to kill him, Ron," said Hermione rolling her eyes. Ginny was still holding up her wand, glaring.

"He's been having sex with Ginny, Hermione!" Ron shouted, pointing at Harry.

"Yes, and you've been having sex with me—" Harry turned green "—as EVERYONE knows, so just get over it. He doesn't deserve to die," said Hermione, putting her wand in her pocket.

Ron turned and looked at Harry in a loathing way.

"Look, Ron—"

And Ron punched him in the nose.

Harry stumbled backwards and hit the wall.

"OW," said Harry. "Mother fu—"

"RON!" shouted Ginny, running to Harry's side. "You idiot."

"Stop being an idiot now, Ron, will you?" asked Hermione, bored.

Ginny took one look at Harry's nose and whirled on Ron—she punched him back.

"OW!" said Ron, tripping over a chair and stumbling into it. Hermione walked over to him and looked at his face.

"You're not hurt," she said.

"Stop being a bitch!" Ron yelled at her.

"WELL STOP BEING A JACKASS!" she screeched, storming up the stairs to the girls' dormitory.

"HEY!" Ron shouted. "WHERE ARE YOU GOING?"

He followed her up, still yelling. She slammed the door behind the both of them—there was yelling, muffled arguing, and then nothing.

"Hypocrite," said Ginny, rubbing Harry's nose.

"Nice to have them back," said Harry bitterly.

"Well they didn't really find out in the best way," said Ginny. "We should have just told Hermione or something, so she could tell him when they were in the middle of...well, you know."

"Ugh," said Harry.

"Well, she's got to get him in a good mood."

"And hearing that his best friend and his sister have been—well, you know—for a month and a half wouldn't kill the magic, then, would it?"

"Well...there's always tomorrow. Or an hour later. You know how they are."

"Point taken," said Harry.

Harry and Ginny took a walk in the courtyard and decided to stay as far away from the Common Room as they could manage—it wasn't until that evening that they saw Hermione and Ron again, in the Great Hall, for dinner.

Harry and Ginny sat down across from McGonagall, voting that to be the safest spot. Rebekah and Alex came in a few minutes later, sat down next to Binns, and started to ask him about death. Ron and Hermione came in, widely welcomed, and sat down at the end of the table, as far away from Harry and Ginny as they could manage. Rebekah stared at Harry, eyebrows raised. Alex shot him an evil grin.

"How ever did you find her?" asked a young Hufflepuff dreamily, staring at them with wide-eyed admiration.

"Er, well—" said Ron.

Hermione raised her eyebrow, gave him a doubtful look, and neither of them said anything.

"Well, er—it was nothing," said Ron, and both of them fell silent. Rebekah giggled.

"My guess is that the s—"

"It was nothing!" said Hermione. "I really wasn't all that lost. You know...the...he didn't really have to look."

No one said anything.

Harry and Ginny had a nice conversation between the two of them, but it both were quite curious about how Ron actually did find Hermione. Neither of them were sure they'd ever be able to ask, however, seeing as how Ron and Harry seemed to be quite in to punching each other.

Harry and Ginny giggled themselves all the way back to the Common Room (full of smuggled firewhiskey from Rebekah and Alex) and stumbled through the door.

"EW!" said Ginny. "STOP THAT, BOTH OF YOU!"

Ron and Hermione were all over each other on the couch in front of the fireplace. Ron's hair was all stuck up in the back and Hermione's face was flushed.

"You should knock, you know," said Ron, pushing Hermione off of him.

"You should do that in private," said Alex, tripping completely on her way through the door and sliding on to the floor with a crack. As usual, her and Rebekah were the more drunk than everyone else in the castle combined.

"I'll take you to the candy shop!" Rebekah sang badly, staggering through the door. She grabbed Ginny for support. "I'm good," she said.

"I'll let you lick the lollypop," sang Alex. They started giggling. Alex and Rebekah started to dance.

"SHAKE THAT LAFFY-TAFFY!" they sang, dancing around.

"Whoops," said Rebekah, and she fell on her arse.

"I ain't sayin' she's a gold digger!" said Rebekah.

"But she ain't messing with no broke—broke!"

"Can you two can it for awhile," said Ginny, rolling her eyes.

"Ooh, the pregnant girl's angry, imagine that," said Alex, opening up another bottle of firewhiskey.

"Ok," said Harry, sitting down across from Ron and Hermione a safe distance away. "What happened?"

Ron and Hermione glanced at each other.

"Well..." Ron started.

Ginny sat down next to Harry. Rebekah pulled herself up off the floor slowly and draped her arms over the couch.

"My guess," she said, blasting Harry and Ginny with stale whiskey-breath, "is that...that, he was using his sex-sense."

They stared.

"Hah," said Alex from somewhere on the floor. "You're like Spider-man, only dirtier. "

Rebekah plopped back onto the floor and crawled over to the coffee table between the two couches.

"Anyway," said Hermione, rolling her eyes. "Well, the Death Eaters took me to Hogsmeade and apparated to somewhere in London—"

"London?" asked Harry, surprised.

"Yeah, well—someone found out that Ron was after me, trying to get me back—"

She beamed at him randomly.

"Well, so, the Death Eaters decided that they didn't want some obnoxious little prat after us, so they went looking for him too...

"They brought him back, and they locked him in the room next to mine, but they hadn't said anything to us in days...I couldn't figure out what they wanted, because they used to come up to me and say things like "You should be proud! Even if you are a mudblood" and stupid things like that...so, I didn't know what to do.

"Well, then, one night, Ron was in the room next to me, and heard all the Death Eaters go into the room. They were talking, I heard some shouting, and then—well, suddenly..."

Hermione went silent. Her eyes got really red, and she looked at Ron.

Harry and Ginny stared at them.

"They, uh..." said Ron, itching his nose. "They wanted to know something about Ginny, I told them to go do something to themselves, and they used the crucio curse on me—"

"I got so angry," said Hermione, sniffing, "that the door just...exploded. I walked in there, punched Neville, stole his wand, and—"

"—Rictusempra'd the bloody hell out of them," finished Ron.

"The door exploded?" asked Ginny doubtfully.

"Yeah, well," said Hermione, scratching her head. "You know how they said that sometimes when a wizard gets angry, or whatever..."

"So we left," said Ron.

"We went back to the Leaky Cauldron," said Hermione.

"Shagged the bloody hell out of each other," said Ron.

Ginny, Harry, Rebekah, and Alex's jaws all dropped.

"Ew," said Ginny, turning red.

"Speaking of the sex," said Alex, and she got up. She staggered over to the door, opened it, and screamed "DRACO!"

Harry shivered.

"Right," said Rebekah. "That wasn't too much information at all."

"Honestly."

"ARGH!" screamed both Ron and Hermione.

Icicle was floating over in the corner, appalled.

"Icicle?" said Hermione, aghast. "You're dead!"

"Good one, smart girl," said Icicle bitterly.

Hermione looked over at Harry, confused.

"She, uh—" tried Harry. "She poisoned herself."

"Why would you kill yourself only to come back as a ghost?" asked Ron, confused. "Isn't that the same as living?"

"Like you would know," she spat.

"It was an accident," said Ginny, shaking her head. "She was cutting herself, and the knife was poisoned."

Hermione giggled.


	21. A Canadian Wedding

"Oh. My. GOD."

It was Ginny, standing over Harry, wearing an expression of total disbelief.

"Harry, you're never going to guess what happened last night."

"No, I remember," said Harry.

"No, I didn't mean that," said Ginny, shaking her head. "Something else. About two people we know. Who are together. Who...got married."

"HERMIONE AND RON GOT MARRIED?" Harry screamed, sitting up to quickly, catching his leg on the sheet, and falling out of his bed.

"NO, you moron," said Ginny, rolling her eyes. She helped him to his feet, and Harry rubbed his sore arm. "Not Hermione and Ron. They would have told us if they were running away together. Or...whatever it is that they did."

"That who did?" Asked Harry, annoyed with Ginny's secrecy. "C'mon, tell me. Tell me."

"It was...Luna and Snape."

Harry shuddered.

"Ew, honestly?" asked Harry, scandalized. "Ew. Ew."

"Last night after dinner, Snape and Luna ran out of grounds and apparated to somewhere in Canada...and...they're married now."

"Where's Canada?" asked Harry.

"It's above AMERICA, you delusional piece of crap," said a voice from the doorway. It was Alex. She looked angry. Her mouth was pulled into an angry scowl, and she was glaring daggers at Harry, who looked surprised to see her standing there.

"Alex?"

"Shut up," she spat, walking into the room. Rebekah was behind her, rolling her eyes.

"What's the matter with her?" asked Harry quietly as Rebekah passed, trying not to provoke Alex.

"She's from Canada," Rebekah whispered. "I was born in Texas, but she didn't move to Dallas until she was about thirteen. Then she went to Quetzalcoatl with me, and we—"

"What the bloody hell is...Queltolculol?" Ginny stumbled through the name.

"Quetzalcoatl," said Alex, rolling her eyes.

"It's the name of our wizarding school in Texas," said Alex.

"Why the weird name?" asked Harry.

"Speaking of weird names," said Rebekah, and this time she rolled her eyes too.

Alex coughed loudly, making a noise that sounded miraculously like 'Hogwarts'.

"Quetzalcoatl is the name of a Mayan God who could change into a winged snake, and there was this wizard, a long long time ago, named Howard Shamot who sailed from France to the Americas to go to Louisiana with the rest of the country, and, well...he got lost. So he met up with this nice group of cannibalistic forest people, and they were like 'hey you can make things explode and stuff!' so he opened up an school to teach their kids about magic. Well—"

This was becoming a much longer story than Harry and Ginny had intended.

"—Pretty soon, people were like 'hey where's Howard?' so they sent a search party out for him. Well...Howard got word of it and was like 'hell no,' so he was going to shut down the school because magic was frowned on and all back then. So the crazy cannibalistic forest people were like 'we'll get them', so Howard stayed and taught magic and they called him Quetzalcoatl because he was an animagus Hawk and a parselmouth," Rebekah finished.

"That doesn't make any sense," said Ginny.

"I know, right?" said Rebekah, shaking her head and smiling. "Pretty soon the school was opened up for anybody who needed to send there kid away for being magical. You know, just so they wouldn't get caught with the whole witchcraft thing."

"So it's like Hogwarts?" Ginny asked.

"Well, yeah. But they put a lot of emphasis on the Dark Arts—you know, because of the whole cannibalism influence—but they also spend a lot of time on Ancient Runes, which they don't even make you guys take here. And Divination—they're really into that. Rumor has it that Howard's wife, the cannibal princess, was a seer."

"Were they really cannibals?" asked Ginny, doubtful.

"Oh yeah," said Rebekah. "But they got over that pretty quickly. Howard wasn't really into the eating people thing, so they kinda stopped."

"They just stopped because he told them to?"

"Wouldn't you, if someone was threatening to crucio you?" asked Alex.

"If I knew what crucio was," said Ginny, shrugging.

"How did we get into this conversation?" asked Harry.

"I don't remember," said Rebekah.

"Anyway," said Alex. "So the headmaster and Luna ran away together."

Harry shuddered again. Ginny patted his shoulder sympathetically.

"Where is her head," said Harry. "I mean, honestly. She could date anybody here and she dates Snape? Ugh."

"I'd hit that," said Alex.

"Me too," said Rebekah.

"I probably would too, Harry," said Ginny.

"EW!" said Harry, backing away from her.

"Well, I'm just being honest," said Ginny, blushing. "He's got that whole angry, tortured soul thing down. I mean, I'd like to be punished by that."

"Me too," said Alex.

Harry screamed.

"You better watch out, Harry," said Rebekah. "Have you been a bad boy?"

Harry screamed again.

"Snape might need to teach you a lesson," said Alex, grinning.

"Yeah," said Rebekah. "He might need to give you detention three—"

"—maybe five," said Alex.

"—times a week," Rebekah finished.

Ginny giggled.

"It might hurt, though," Ginny added. "But you deserve it."

"Yeah, he might need to use his wand," said Rebekah.

Harry felt like he had just experienced eight simultaneous heart attacks.

Ginny, Rebekah, and Alex laughed so hard they were nearly crying.

"Yeah, but, if anybody's getting detention from Snape it's Draco," said Rebekah, giving Alex a serious look.

"Shut your mouth," said Alex.

"Ooh," said Harry, suddenly interested. "What what what what!"

"Draco's a little shy," said Alex, shaking her head.

"Try flaming homosexual," said Rebekah. "He's practically in love with you, Harry. Any day now, he'll be calling up Voldemort saying 'Don't kill Harry I love him I love him I love him!'."

"HE'S NOT GAY," said Alex, suddenly angry. "AT LEAST I HAVE A BOYFRIEND."

"At least I didn't turn a Death Eater!" Rebekah shouted at her.

"I DIDN'T TURN ANYTHING!" Alex shouted. "JUST BECAUSE HE DIDN'T WANT TO—"

Harry nearly died, again, for the third time that morning.

"JUST BECAUSE I DON'T HAVE A BOYFRIEND DOESN'T MEAN I COULDN'T!" Rebekah screamed.

"OH, GO MAKE OUT WITH ICICLE, WHORE!"

Rebekah's face froze in one of fury. Then, suddenly, before anybody knew what to do, she—

"RICTUSEMPRA!" She shouted. Alex was blasted by silver light and flew over backwards.

"BITCH!" she shouted, taking out her wand. "SECTUMSEMPRA!"

As soon as she had said it, Alex looked immediately regretful. Tiny scratches suddenly appeared all over Rebekah's body, as if she had been attacked by little birds with angry claws.

"You're really lucky some spells don't effect House Elves the way they effect full-blood humans," said Rebekah, glaring at her. "EXPELLIARMUS!"

Alex was hit again, and this time, she crashed into the wall.

"Taratellangra!" Alex shouted, and Rebekah's feet started to dance around uncontrollably.

"HEY!" she said, "WINGARDIUM LEVIOSA!"

Alex flew up into the air. She kicked her feet around, floating, unable to get back down.

"Cut it out!" she said, as she floated near the ceiling, almost completely upside down.

"Can you guys cut it out," said a seventh year boy, appearing in the doorway, looking sleepy. "You're waking the whole tower up!"

"Immobulus!" Ginny shouted. Both girls froze.

"Thanks," said the boy. He disappeared.

"Anyway," said Ginny, leaving them frozen. "So, now Snape and Luna aren't going to be back for a while, and McGonagall's taken over as Headmistress."

"No way," said Harry, feeling a little better.

"Luna's dad let her do it, apparently. Crazy people," she said, rolling her eyes.

"Hey."

Harry and Ginny turned, finding Hermione and Ron at the door. Rebekah and Alex, who were still frozen, disapparated out of the room almost simultaneously.

"What's up?" said Ron, coming into the room.

"Luna and Snape ran away together," said Ginny, looking as if she completely enjoyed spreading this news around. "It's all over the school. McGonagall's taken over."

"Ew," said Hermione. "No way!"

"Yeah," said Ginny. "Ew."

"Ugh," said Harry. "Whatever. Who was the one who was like 'oh yeah, I'd hit that'."

"I never said 'I'd hit that'," Ginny pressed, going red. "I just agreed that I thought he was worthy."

"Ew," said Hermione.

"Oh whatever," said Ron. "You were the one who made me say 'ten points from Gryffindor, Miss Granger' in a Snape voice."

Harry's jaw dropped, scandalized.

Ginny giggled.

"Hey Harry, maybe I'll make you—"

"NO!" said Harry, looking completely revolted.

"Fine," said Ginny, looking put out.

"Well," said Hermione, turning red. "I'm not the only one with problems, Ron. You're the one who was like 'wear a wig like Galadria'—"

"This is an odd conversation," said Harry.

"Right, anyway," said Hermione. "We'll get back to this argument later, Ron."

"At least Galadria's good-looking," said Ron spitefully.

"Yeah, but Snape's got the angry Death Eater thing going," said Ginny. "I mean, you can't violate Lucius, because that's like violating a girl...you know, with the hair and all. But Snape's got the double-agent thing, the Dark Arts thing, the—"

"Greasy-haired git thing?" Harry tried.

"Mmm," said Hermione. "Greasy-haired git."

Harry shuddered again.

"You girls are crazy," said Ron, shaking his head.

"I feel violated myself," said Harry, hiding under his sheets.

"Right," said Hermione, suddenly sounding businesslike. "We need to talk."

Harry stuck his head out of his sheets nervously, and Ginny played with her hair.

"Since there's this whole...you know...er, Voldemort problem," Hermione started. She was looking at the ceiling, avoiding them. Ron was playing with something on the floor with his foot. "We've decided that we need to start figuring out ways to beat this."

Harry looked at her and said nothing.

"No offense, Hermione," said Harry. "But...what do you really expect us to do about it."

Hermione turned faintly pink, but didn't loose her businesslike composure.

"Well..." she started. "Well, we could—I was thinking, well—"

She stopped, looking pained.

"Go to the library?" Ron tried.

Hermione glared at him.

"Well, because we're all..."

"Pregnant," Ginny helped.

"Yes," said Hermione, looking pale.

Harry looked over at Ginny secretly, studying her stomach. He tried not to notice it, normally, but it was becoming hard to ignore.

"Right, well. I've made an executive decision—"

Ron snorted back his laughter.

"—and I've decided that we need to start focusing on this thing. We need to get this worked out. We need to beat this."

Harry and Ginny looked at each other. Ginny jumped up on his bed and cuddled next to him, looking thoroughly depressed.

"Right, well," said Hermione, looking annoyed that everyone wasn't automatically stirred to go to the library with her. "I'm going to go look around a bit—even if no one else does."

She glared at Ron, who looked as if going to the library was the last thing he wanted to do that day, and followed anyway.

Harry and Ginny stayed on his bed, said nothing to each other, and felt depressed about everything.


	22. Harry's New Mommy

"Harry, quit that," said Hermione, snapping. Harry was sitting across from her and Ron in the library—he and Ginny were ripping the pages out of books and bewitching them to float around and give whoever they hit an electric shock.

"_Harry,_" said Hermione. Ron was sitting across from him, smirking into the book he was reading, trying to avoid laughing.

"WHEN I CATCH WHO'S DOING THIS," screamed Madam Pince, the librarian. "I'M GOING TO HEX YOU INTO OBLIVION!"

Harry and Ginny avoided her glare as she walked past them with an angry-looking group of Ravenclaws and a Hufflepuff third-year, whose hair was smoking and looked confused. Hermione sat across from them with her eyebrow raised, clearly saying "See what you've done?" with her gaze. Ron stifled a giggle. Hermione glared at her red-haired boyfriend.

"This is serious, Harry," said Hermione. "You see, this is why we can never get anything done. You never helped me with Buckbeak's trial, you never helped with SPEW, you never helped me with—well, AND I ALWAYS HELPED YOU! Remember the Accio charm? Remember? And not to mention you never even study for your own exams—"

"Hermione, the Ravenclaws are looking at us again," said Ron, looking worried.

"Shut up, MUM," said Ginny, looking sour. She and Harry went back to their books, but they could hear Hermione nearly growling from across the table.

"God," Harry heard Ginny mutter to herself. She was shaking her head at her book, Family First: Your Step-by-Step Plan for Creating a Phenomenal Family, by someone named Dr. Phil.

"Hermione, this is absolutely crap," said Ginny, throwing it down on the table.

"Well...it's quite popular in America," muttered Hermione, turning a little pink.

"Among wizards, or muggles," Ginny asked sharply. "Because they keep mentioning a 'marcowave' and I have no idea what that is."

"Microwave," Harry corrected. "It—cooks food," he finished, after receiving a dirty look from his girlfriend.

"Yeah, well I don't care," said Ginny. "Honestly, I don't have any idea what this can do to help the...my little...situation."

"Wait a minute," said Hermione, grabbing it. "Oh, this one was mine."

They stared at her, confused.

"Well...I picked up some things to read for when my—you know, situation...arrives."

They all looked at her like she was crazy, when finally, after a moment of awkward silence, Ron burst out laughing.

For the third time that day, the Ravenclaws glared at them. A group of Hufflepuff's sitting in a table down from them glared jealously, because they were too frightened to laugh in the presence of Ravenclaws.

Suddenly, out of nowhere, Nigel (Ron's minion) appeared behind a stack of books.

"Sir?"

"Yes Nigel," Ron said without looking up from his book, All-American Girl by muggle author Meg Cabot, which Hermione was making him read.

"I was told to find you sir," he said. "I looked all evening, it took ages, I haven't eaten in hours—"

He was staring at Harry with wide-eyed admiration. Harry tried to ignore it, but Ginny glared at him in a "don't even think about it" sort of way.

"—Ron, you really should let the boy go," said Hermione, reading Interview With The Vampire, by Anne Rice. "It's really just like slavery, you know, the way he follows you around calling you 'sir'. Honestly, you haven't learned anything from SPEW—"

"My subjects happen to consider it an honor to serve their king," said Ron. "Thank you very much."

"Ugh, king—"

"Their name, not mine—"

"—and so I finally found you," Nigel continued without stopping. "And they told me to bring you to the Great Hall before they got here, but I'm afraid it might be too late, I can't remember when they stopped me—"

"Nigel, stop it please," said Ron.

"Hey, Nigel, can you go get me a bottle of water?" Ginny asked.

"Honestly," said Hermione.

"But they're coming now," said Nigel, stomping his foot, still staring at Harry.

"What are you on about, Nigel?" asked Ron. "Either tell us what you're doing here, or bugger off."

"—Luna and her husband, sir," said Nigel. "She wants to see you. She ordered it."

Hermione looked up from her book with a confused look on her face. "She ordered it?"

"Yes," said Nigel, looking nervously away from them. "She didn't really say how she had that power—because I told her sir, I told her that you were the king, and she was like—"

"Nigel, your point," Ron said.

"—Right, sorry, anyway—so she said that she ordered it, and that if I didn't listen to her then...then..."

"Then..." said Ron, trying to hurry the boy up.

"That she would..." he gulped. "Call my mother."

Ginny shot Harry a weird look, not understanding this—possibly because they didn't know Nigel's mother, but also because it didn't really seem like something Luna would do. Seeing, as it were, that she herself had an affair with a thirty-something year old man.

"Er," said Ron, looking wary. "Alright, I'll be right down."

"You better go now, Sir," said Nigel. "I mean, you don't know my mum or anything, but—"

"I wasn't under the impression that it was your place to make suggestions, Nigel," said Ron.

"RON," said Hermione. "Leave the boy alone."

"Her Majesty is merciful," said Nigel, making a bow.

"No, Nigel, please don't do that—"

"If I have angered you in some way, your majesty, I'm eternally regretful—"

"Nigel, quit calling me 'your majesty', I'm not a que—"

"I'm sorry, Your Grace," he said.

"NIGEL—"

"For God's sake, Hermione, just let him call you 'your majesty'—" Ron tried.

"This is completely ridiculous—" Hermione snapped, throwing her book down.

The Hufflepuff's were beginning to get nervous, and the Ravenclaws were bristling.

"You know what, I'm getting out of here before another fight starts up," said Hermione, glaring at him.

She, Harry, Ron, and Ginny got up from the table and walked out of the library; Hermione and Ron were still arguing quietly, but Ginny and Harry stayed behind them, trying not to spark their notice. Nigel, Harry noticed, was following them.

"Hey," said Harry, trying to get their attention as they walked through the corridors, argument slowly getting louder.

"You're such a hypocrite," said Ron, rolling his eyes.

"Hypocrite," she barked. "How, exactly, SIR, am I the hypocrite—"

"Bitch—"

"Oh God," Ginny muttered.

"ASSHOLE," Hermione yelled at him.

"Why don't you make yourself useful and go back to the library where you belong," said Ron.

"BURN!" Hermione hissed. "Warthog. Why don't you go roll around in your mother's pigpen?"

"Why don't you go sleep with Malfoy?"

Hermione grabbed his arm furiously and pulled him backwards.

"LISTEN YOU ARROGANT—"

Harry and Ginny stopped so they could argue, and continued to talk to each other.

"So what were you reading?" asked Ginny.

"Pride and Prejudice," said Harry. "What did you read?"

"Best Erotica of the year, or something like that," said Ginny. "Weird stuff."

"Anything I'd be into?"

"Not really," said Ginny.

"—AND YOU NEVER LISTEN TO ME, WALKING AROUND HERE LIKE YOU OWN THE PLACE—!" Hermione shouted.

"—EVERYTHING IS ALWAYS ABOUT YOU, NO MATTER WHERE WE GO—!" Ron shouted back.

"—YEAH WELL MAYBE IF YOU WOULD PULL YOUR HEAD OUT OF YOUR OWN ASS EVERY ONCE IN A WHILE—!"

"—WELL IF YOU HATE ME SO MUCH THEN WHY DON'T YOU FIND SOMEBODY ELSE TO ARGUE WITH—"

"—FINE!" Hermione screamed, hysterical. "THE BABY ISN'T YOURS ANYWAY—MAYBE IT IS DRACO'S!"

The hallway stopped.

Unfortunately for Draco, who happened to be walking up the hallway at that very moment with his arm over the shoulder of his girlfriend, Alex, you could hear everything Hermione had just said nearly perfectly.

Nigel's jaw dropped.

"Thou didst cheat on HIS HIGHNESS?" Nigel shouted, hysterical.

"Nigel," said Harry quickly. "You're dismissed."

"Yes—yes sir," said Nigel, looking in between Ron and Hermione.

Ron was staring at Hermione with an odd look on his face—instead of the wild fury that had been there when he had thought Harry had been with Hermione, there was this weird, twisted grin on his face. As suddenly as it appeared, it vanished.

Hermione, on the other hand, looked as if she did not mean to say that so loudly. Automatically, she seemed as if she was going to apologize, but before she could—

"Fine," said Ron, and without another word, he turned and disappeared down the hallway.

Harry looked in-between Ron and Hermione, who looked panicked. Ginny, however, was staring at Alex and Draco.

"Alex, I wouldn't—"

"Draco," said Alex, a bitter tone in her voice.

"Alex, she's a mudblood, you know how I feel about them—"

"REBEKAH!" Alex shouted. With a pop, Rebekah appeared.

"Yup," said Rebekah, looking tired.

"Draco's been cheating on me with the Granger person," said Alex, pointing at Draco. Draco's jaw dropped in an attempt to protest, but Rebekah cut him off.

"You prick," said Rebekah, glaring at him.

"She's a mudblood, Rebekah," said Alex. "A mudblood."

"God," said Rebekah, looking disgusted.

Hermione was so panic-stricken she didn't even notice what they were saying—Harry and Ginny, on the other hand, had their wands out.

"You bastard," said Rebekah, pulling Alex away.

"Alex," said Draco.

They disapparated with a crack.

"HARRY!" someone shouted.

It was Luna.

She was standing at the door wearing what looked like a yellow sun dress. She had sunglasses with big white frames on, had a suitcase floating behind her with a big red Disneyland sticker on it, and was grinning like a fool.

"HARRY!" she shouted. People were whispering behind their hands, pointing at her. Without another word, she gripped him in a life-crushing hug, and squealed.

"Harry, my husband would like to see you in his office," said Luna. "And so would I."

For a moment, he just stared at her.

"What—?"

"Come with me," she pulled him along with a death grip. Ginny, looking confused, followed after them.

"Harry, you can't even imagine how excited I am about all of this," she said. "Severus and I are ready to do anything—"

Harry shot Ginny a repulsed look. Ginny shook her head, and kept following.

"Right," said Luna, stopping in front of Snape's old office in the dungeons. "Severus?"

They entered the office, and Harry wasn't surprised to find Snape still in his old black cloak, not looking at all cheery.

"Luna..." said Snape, shooting her a dark look.

"Sevvie," said Luna. "Remember what I said..."

"This isn't a good idea," said Snape with a sigh.

"Sit, Harry," said Luna, and Harry collapsed in the chair.

Ginny stood in the corner, looking scared.

Snape sat down in his chair, glaring at Luna, who glared back just as sharply. Harry looked in-between the two, completely lost.

"Harry," said Snape slowly, in his foulest way. Ginny was in the back, nearly fainting at the sound of his voice. "I'm just going to be as quick with this as possible..."

Harry shot Ginny another look. Surely Snape wouldn't torture him right in front of Ginny.

"Your mother was hot, Harry," said Snape.

It took Harry a minute to process this. When he finally realized what Snape had just said, he threw up a little in his mouth.

"—Sorry, what?" said Harry, choking.

"Your mother, Harry—"

Why was Snape calling him Harry? What happened to Potter?

"—when I met her, we were only kids...I had grown up in a house where magic was shunned, and, when I arrived at Hogwarts for the first time, I had trouble coping to the difference..."

Harry was confused. Where was this going?

"Your mother, unfortunately, went to Gryffindor, and...I did, as you know, go to Slytherin..."

Ginny was squirming uncomfortably. Clearly, she was picking up something Harry wasn't.

"I fell in with the Slytherins, who seemed like my friends...when I joined the Death Eaters, I did it under their influence..."

Harry scoffed. Snape ignored it.

"Your mother, as I soon found out, was uncommonly kind to those with differences. Remus Lupin, I'm sure, could tell you this. We were some of the few who knew about Lupin's, er...furry little problem. She was different than most people in the school, and I just wanted to let you know that I loved her very much—"

Harry stared, completely oblivious as to how he should respond.

"—your mother was a Death Eater, Harry," said Snape.

Ginny choked back a laugh.

Harry kept staring.

"—she was an informal Death Eater. She was recruited by the Dark Lord near the end of our time at Hogwarts, and I thought, as did many people, that she was genuine. Finally, Voldemort gave me a top-secret assignment—I was to give your mother love potions."

Harry was absolutely speechless.

"—But I felt bad for Lily. I had been unkind to her in school, but she was always civil to me—I couldn't bring myself to give them to her. As she came out of her spell, an unfortunate thing happened..."

Harry's jaw dropped. Ginny was whimpering.

"—we made love."

Harry screamed.

Ginny gasped.

"WHAT?" Harry screeched, incredulous.

"Harry," said Snape calmly, rolling his eyes. "There's more—"

Harry put his hands over his ears. "I'm not listening I'm not listening I'm not listening—"

"You're my son, Harry," Snape said.

"I'M NOT LISTENING I'M NOT LISTENING I'M NOT LISTENING—"

But Harry heard him anyway.

"That's—that's IMPOSSIBLE!" said Harry. "Everybody's always saying I look like James—"

"Well, Harry, sometimes things are possible in fanficti—"

"You can't control the forces of love, Harry," said Luna.

"GOD, SHUT UP!" Harry shouted at her.

"Harry, I'm your new mommy!" Luna said. "I'm your step-mother, whether you like it or not, and you can't speak to us that way—"

Not wanting to hear another word, Harry turned on his heel, grabbed Ginny, and rushed out of the room.


	23. Ron and Hermione Fight Again

Harry and Ginny sprinted down the hallway as fast as they could while Ginny chanted "No way no way no way no way...ew ew ew ew ew ew ew..."

"GINNY THAT'S NOT MAKING IT ANY BETTER," Harry shouted at her. There was a first year walking towards them down the hall, but as soon as Harry shouted he turned and ran back the other way.

"Harry," said Ginny. "Maybe you should...we should...oh dear..."

"GINNY SHUT UP!" said Harry. "We're just going to go back to the tower and make sweet love all night long and pretend none of this happened..."

Ginny wrinkled her nose and gave him a scared look.

"Harry," Ginny said. "You know, maybe this isn't so bad—"

"NOT SO BAD? NOT SO BAD? I FIND OUT THAT OUR EVIL POTIONS TEACHER IS MY FATHER AND ALL YOU HAVE TO SAY IS THAT IT'S NOT—TOO—BAD?"

"DON'T YELL AT ME I CAN'T HELP IT THAT SNAPE BANGED YOUR MOTHER!"

This would have been an excellent thing to say in an argument if not for the horrible fact that Ginny and Harry had both strolled into the courtyard the minute she said it. It wasn't a particularly cold February afternoon, nor was it raining, or too icy—alas, the courtyard was packed with waiting students who heard this, and, very slowly turned to face them.

The students stared at Ginny and Harry. Harry glared at Ginny, and Ginny had a look of horrified guilt on her face.

"Did she just say—?"

Harry grabbed Ginny's arm and pulled her back inside, where they ran as quickly as they could back to the common room.

"Why did you do that?" Harry shouted. "Frange Femur," he told the fat lady, and they went inside.

"YOU HAVE TO BE SO UNGRATEFUL ALL THE TIME—"

"I CAN'T HELP IT IF YOU'RE A BITCH!"

"YOU—ARROGANT—PIECE—OF—"

"OH, SHUT UP!"

Harry and Ginny's argument came to a halt as they came into the common room. From somewhere above, Harry could hear Hermione and Ron fighting. The kids in the common room looked annoyed, especially Seamus and Dean, who were surrounded by a bunch of trunks.

"Hiya Harry," said Seamus. "How's it going?"

"Hi Seamus," said Harry. "You're back."

"My mum sent me back," said Seamus. "But I think I came back at the wrong time..."

"I HATE YOU!" someone, most likely Hermione, screamed from upstairs.

"How long have they been at it this way?" asked Harry.

"Hours," said Dean, leaning back in the chair.

"Harry," said Seamus, looking worried. "I don't want to put the spot on you or anything, but...seeing as you're their best friend and everything...well, couldn't you go up there and break them up or something?"

This suggestion was greeted by a "YES, PLEASE," from the rest of the common room.

At this point in time, going upstairs to break up another Weasley/Granger fight was not the first thing he wanted to do.

"Oh, but—"

"Harry, please," said Romilda Vane, appearing out of nowhere. "You'd be my hero forever."

Ginny pushed Harry out of the way and got up in Romilda's face with a foul frown on her face, daring Romilda to come any closer. Romilda had to be at least a foot taller than Ginny, but she backed off anyway.

"God," said Harry. "But everytime—"

"GO!" shouted Ginny, and she pushed him up the stairs.

Harry and Ginny went farther and farther up and the screaming got even louder and louder.

"YOU ARE THE MOST SELFISH WART I'VE EVER MET!"

"YOU DON'T HAVE TO BE SUCH A LIAR ALL THE TIME—"

Harry and Ginny opened the door only to find Hermione and Ron, who were standing in the middle of the room, faces barely two inches apart from each other. Ginny shot Harry an awkward look.

"Uh," said Harry. "Guys?"

Hermione and Ron turned and looked at the pair, red in the face from all the yelling.

"Hey, do you think you can keep it down a little? Everyone is trying to study—"

"I'M LEAVING," said Hermione, whirling around and exiting.

Ron threw his arms up in the air. Harry opened up his mouth to console Ron, but—

"FANTASTIC, Harry," he said, rolling his eyes.

Harry stopped.

"What—?"

"WE WERE THIS CLOSE TO MAKING UP, and you INTERRUPTED US!"

Harry and Ginny stared at him, not believing their ears.

"But," Ginny tried. "You two have been arguing for hours..."

"Yeah, and we were almost done until YOU came in. Now we're going to have to go through all that ALL OVER AGAIN..."

Harry was confused. His patience with Ron was running out.

"Ok, Ron," said Ginny. "Whatever."

"Well, you're going to have to help me now," said Ron, looking irritable. "Help me get into the girl's dormitory."

Ginny rolled her eyes and stalked out. Ron followed, running into Harry's shoulder as he did so.

"Thanks, Harry," said Seamus and Dean, as he came down the stairs. "Thanks a million—"

"Thanks for nothing," Ron shouted from the hallway, and a door slammed.

"Don't thank me," said Harry. "Believe me, they're probably just going to start up again..."

"GET OUT!" someone screamed.

"ARGH!" Ron shouted—the stairway collapsed and Ron appeared at the bottom, red-faced and looking angry.

"Perfect, Harry," he said. "Absolutely perfect. FANTASTIC."

"Sorry, Ron, I didn't know—"

Harry was so fed up with Ron's attitude that he took Ginny's arm, pulled her outside, and said very loudly (loud enough so Ron could hear, anyway) "Let's go find the room of requirement, eh, Ginny?"

Ron grumbled something at Harry, and went back upstairs.

Harry and Ginny took a walk around the courtyard and talked about Snape, who they were hoping to avoid for quite some time. Suddenly, out of nowhere, Alex and Rebekah walked out of the Forbidden Forest, talking to each other in low whispers.

"Well that's not the point, is it?" said Rebekah. "If he's gone to the other side—HARRY."

Alex whirled, looking surprised.

"Harry," the Slytherin said, in a voice that wasn't exactly happy-to-see-you.

Ginny and Harry looked at them.

"What were you talking about?" asked Ginny, looking suspicious.

Rebekah shot Alex a nervous look.

"Fanfiction," said Alex quickly.

Ginny and Harry stared.

"God," said Harry. "What is it with this school and fanfiction?"

"I don't know," said Rebekah. "Ask Snape. He's the one who staged this whole thing."

"What whole thing?" Ginny asked.

"Nothing," said Alex. "Nevermind. What did I tell you about keeping your mouth closed?"

"Shut up," said Rebekah.

"Anyway," said Alex. "We heard Ron and Hermione fighting again. What's it all about this time?"

"Uh," said Harry. "Well..."

"Nevermind," said Alex. "I don't care."

"Hey Ginny," said Rebekah. "You should come have some tea with us with Madam Rosmerta some time. Did you know that she was once a preschool teacher?"

"No wonder she runs a pub," said Alex.

"Yeah," said Rebekah. "You might try talking to her about baby things. She knows an awful lot—what was she just telling us about, Alex?"

"Teething? I can't remember."

Ginny looked as if listening to a woman talk about teething was the last thing she wanted to do, but before she could respond, Alex and Rebekah grabbed her arm and pulled her along.

"Alright Ginny," said Harry. "I'll...I'll see you later!"

Ginny shot him a dirty look and was tugged along by the two half-elves.


	24. Blood Traitors in the Forbidden Forrest

Harry was sitting in the Common Room with Hermione, feeling more and more agitated the later it got, with Ginny still gone. He was disliking Rebekah and Alex more and more as every lonely, red-head less moment passed.  
Hermione was sitting across from him, stooping over her papers in her usual way, grumbling angrily more than usual.

"Hermione," said Harry, getting anxious.

"Hm?" she said absent-mindedly, not really paying attention.

"What do you think Ginny is doing with Rebekah and Alex?" he wondered, tapping his chin with his pencil.

"Sure," she said, furrowing her brow.

"That wasn't a yes or no question, Hermione," Harry said bitterly.

"What?" she asked, still not looking up.

"You know what," said Harry, sitting up. "I'm tired of this. It's not safe for three girls to be wandering around from Hogsmeade and back in the middle of the night."

"What?" she asked, still looking at her paper.

It wasn't until Harry arrived at the bottom of the stairs, holding his invisibility cloak, that Hermione finally glanced up at him, frowned distastefully, and glared at him.

"Harry, why does every solution to a problem have to involve the Forbidden Forest and the invisibility cloak. 'Hey Ron, there's a problem!' 'OH NOES!' 'Let's get the cloak and the map!' 'OK!'."

"Right, the map," said Harry, and he ran back up the stairs.

"You're a prat," she said, as he appeared once more.

"You're just upset because you're not getting any," he said.

"Neither are you," she said.

"That's what you'd like to think," said Harry, raising his eyebrows suggestively.

"Yuck," she said.

"Right, anyway," he said. "I'm going after her."

"Sometimes it's like you just invent problems. 'Oh dear, Ginny's been gone for thirty minutes. I must save her!'"

"You're a bitch," he said, glaring at her over his glasses.

"I'm also pregnant, and if you call me a bitch one more time I'm going to hex your wand into a knot."

Harry winced uncomfortably.

"I want you to watch the map," said Harry. "If you see anything suspicious, I want you to find Ron—" she wrinkled her nose "—find Ron and come after us."

"Yeah whatever Magic Boy," she said.

Harry was just about to go out the door when he heard a sudden suspicious, familiar giggling coming from the girl's stairs.

"Draco," Romilda was saying as she appeared, looking frustrated as usual. "That's a horrible thing to sa—"

She suddenly caught sight of Harry at the door, and shut her mouth, turning a little pink. Harry glared at her, disgusted.

"Oh, hi Harry," she said faintly. Draco appeared behind her, looking devious as usual.

"Yeah," said Harry, and he backed out the portrait hole.

The boy continued until he was out of the portrait's sight, and then slipped under his cloak. He walked past the ghosts and occasional students, finally slipping out into the courtyard and out along the black lake, sneaking past Hagrid's hut and into the forest.

Harry and Ron had traveled along this path many time before on their trips to Hogsmeade, so he didn't need the map's assistance in getting there. Feeling himself to be safe and quite alone, he wasn't making as much of an effort to be quiet as he should have. What he couldn't have known, however, was what Hermione was just seeing on the map—Draco. He was following Harry into the forest. She choked on her pumpkin juice, ruining her essay.

Hermione pulled her coat on and immediately sprinted out the door, wand in hand and too proud to go look for Ron.

This would have been a problem in any other situation, but Ron happened to be coming down the dormitory stairs the minute she disappeared out the door. He looked around, confused, and inspected Hermione's ruined essay. The map, he recognized, was sitting haphazardly on the table, tossed aside as if it wasn't the most valuable artifact within the castle. He rolled his eyes, and picked it up.

He searched for Hermione, who he could not locate. Peeves was in the upstairs hall, ruining a painting, and Snape was in his office with—the horror—Luna. McGonagall was pacing in her office, and Ernie McMillian and Hannah Abbot were in an empty Ancient Ruins classroom, most likely doing something that they shouldn't.

"Cormac, Romilda, Finnigan, the Fat Friar...ha! There! Hermione!"

He paused.

"Where on Earth is she going? Wait—there's Harry, and—"

He stuffed the map and disappeared out the portrait hole, pulling out his wand as he did so.

Harry was walking along in the forest, feeling quite sure of himself, however unwary, when he suddenly heard it.

There was a crack behind him, and Harry whirled, losing the hood of his cloak as he did so.

"Who's there!" he called, voice urgent.

"It's no use, Potter!" said a voice—Harry recognized it instantly.

"Come out, Malfoy," he said, tone bitter and loathing. "Or are you too afraid to face me man to man?"

"Oh, shut up Potter," said Malfoy, strolling out from behind a tree. "This may catch you by surprise, but I'm not here to torture you for once."

"Like you could ever manage to bother me—"

"Yeah, shut up you moron," Draco said, rolling his eyes. "Bloody git."

"HARRY!" a female voice called. "HARRY! UGH—" there was a gasp. "HARRY! Oh, sodding—"

"Hermione!" said Harry, feeling foolish. He suddenly realized that he had instructed a very pregnant girl to follow after him in a dark, werewolf-infested forest.

"HERMIONE!" called another voice, male. "HERMIONE! WHERE ARE YOU! HERMIONE!"

"RON!" she called. Somewhere in the darkness, the two of them met. All Harry could see was Draco, standing in front of him, holding his wand uncomfortably.

"Hermione?" Harry asked aloud. He heard nothing, and could only assume it meant that Hermione and Ron had chosen this very inopportune moment to make up.

"Alright Potter," said Draco, strutting toward him. Harry whipped out his wand, ready for any of Draco's tricks. "I have a bargain to make with you."

Harry glared at him, unsure where this was going. Was Draco trying to trick him? Was Draco smart enough to trick him?

Hermione and Ron appeared, looking flushed and pleased with themselves. Hermione and Ron already had their wands out, facing Draco.

"I would feel better if you'd ask your friends to leave," said Draco, taking the opportunity to make an awkward glance at Ron.

"Whatever you have to say to me you can say in front of my friends," said Harry. "It's not like they're paying attention anyway."

This was true. They were now snogging.

"You're not going to find your girlfriend," said Draco.

Hermione and Ron stopped snogging.

"You filthy Slytherin bastard!" said Ron. "What'd you do with Ginny!"

"I didn't do anything with your sister, Weasley," he spat. "I don't care what the Death Eaters want with her."

"The Death Eaters!" said Harry, going towards him. "What do you mean, Death Eaters!"

"It's not me!" said Draco, pointing at himself. "I couldn't care less what my father and his friends do. But I thought—well, it's going to get out anyway—stupid whorecr—"

"What do you mean, 'it's going to get out anyway'?" asked Hermione slowly.

"Don't interrupt him!" said Harry. "Just—well, tell me where Ginny is! What did your father do with her!"

"My father didn't do anything with her!" Draco shouted. "There's not enough brains in his stupid blonde head to know what to do with her—I'm talking about Alex and Rebekah."

Hermione, Ron, and Harry stared at him in silence.

"Well," said Draco, faltering a little. "It's just that—she knew about, um—something. And, well, I knew about her, so she never said anything, but now she's told my father because of her—" he pointed at Hermione, who looked as if she had no clue what he was talking about. "—Shouting away about things that would never happen right for everyone to hear. So Alex thought—but it wasn't true, and I didn't—so she told my dad. I wasn't even snogging Cormac—I don't know what she's talking about—"

It took Harry and Ron a moment to process this, but Hermione got it almost instantly.

"Wait—" she started. "What—?"

"I WASN'T SNOGGING CORMAC!" he shouted. "I might've, if she hadn't burst in like she did, but then she was already going on about how she was going to tell my dad, and I tried to lie, but—"

Draco stopped, and looked at Ron.

"Damn you Weasleys'," he said. "And your—quidditch, and your farmer tans, and...messy house, and...biceps, and silky red-hair..."

Harry nearly died in his spot. Ron was beat red.

"Draco," said Hermione. "Are you—you're—oh my God. You're in love with Ron."

"I AM NOT!" he shouted, turning a little red himself.

"Biceps? Red hair? Tan?"

"I said FARMER'S TAN," Draco pressed, looking embarrassed.

"You like the freckles too, don't you?" she asked knowingly.

"They are quite nice," he said. "I mean—!"

Hermione burst out laughing. Ron looked as if it would have pleased him to hex Draco into the next century.

"Yeah, well, she gets what she deserves!" said Draco. "It was what they were planning all along. They put Neville under the Imperius curse, and—and told my dad about Hermione, and then found out they were wrong, and they were there when that teacher had a prophesy—"

"Those bitches!" said Hermione, scandalized.

"—Then they took Ginny down to Hogsmeade."

"Fantastic," said Harry. "Now what am I supposed to do?"

Draco stared at him pointedly, then pointed to himself and said:

"DUH!"

"Well what do you have to do with anything," said Harry. "Everyone knows you're too gay to be a Death Eater."

"Le sigh," said Draco, rolling his eyes. "Ok—you know how I said that 'I knew about her'? Well—When Alex found out about me and Cormac, she started to use it against me as some kind of a sick joke. I knew she was in line with the Dark Lord, but I didn't know how much she was in line—then I overheard her and Rebekah speaking to my dad through the fire one night—"

"So you figured out their plan," said Harry.

"Yes," he said. "And I would have kept my mouth shut, but Alex just nearly told my father about Cormac—so I decided to use her secret against her so she'd keep her mouth shut. But then, that one day, when Hermione and Weasley were fighting again, she said something about the baby being mine—I'm a bit bisexual, but I would never touch her, I swear. She thought I was making the whole thing up, and freaked out, thought I was cheating on her and in line with your side, and ran off and told my dad about—"

Draco stopped.

"About...Ron?" Hermione guessed. Ron gagged.

"Yes," said Draco, turning red again. "My father disowned me—said he couldn't bear the likes of a girl like me being in the family. To him, I'm no better than a blood traitor."

"So you're telling us all of this to get back at your dad?" asked Harry.

"Mostly," said the blonde with a shrugg.

"You really suck at the blood-traitor thing," Harry added.

"It's my first day!" said Draco. "Be quiet!"

"I must tell you, Draco," said Hermione. "I'm not exactly opposed to this crush you have on Ron. Actually, it's...kind of—"

"Don't say it!" said Ron, who had been keeping quiet. "If you say it, I'm going to throw up! I swear!"

Draco rolled his eyes.

"I get it Weasley, you're not gay," he said. "I'll just shag George or something."

"UGH!" said Ron, scandalized.

"Oh come on," said Draco. "Seven children? One of them is bound to be gay."

"Well, I always thought it was Charlie," said Ron with an unpleasant frown.

"Think again," said Draco.

"Well, where is my girlfriend?" Harry shouted.

"Chill out," said Draco. "Where do you think she is? Death Eaters aren't very clever, you know."

Harry fell silent.

"Tom Riddle's house?" he wondered aloud.

"Bingo," said Draco. "You're smarter than I've been telling people."


	25. Duel in the Graveyard

Harry was being closely followed by Draco, Hermione, and Ron as they furiously made their way out of the forbidden forest and into Hogsmeade, where they would be able to apparate.

"I thought I should just warn you Harry," said Ron. "I haven't really mastered the whole apparating thing."

"You can hold on to me," said Hermione.

"You can hold on to me all night long," said Draco, grinning evilly.

Ron turned red and pulled out his wand. Hermione stopped him quickly, preventing him from doing anything stupid.

"Can you all shut up," said Harry. They were almost to the gates, and he could see the Shrieking Shack in the distant, looming under the full moon.

"Poor Lupin," said Ron, glancing up at it.

"Now," said Harry. He wasn't exactly sure where he was going, so he grabbed onto Ron and Hermione's hands, and Draco, quickly grabbing onto the back of Ron's shirt, disapparated with them.

"QUIT TOUCHING ME!" said Ron as they were pulled out of Hogsmeade, and disappeared.

His words, however, came to a sharp halt as they landed in the cemetery, which was dead silent and filled with nostril-choking black fog.

"Harry," Hermione breathed. "Where are we?"

"The cemetery," said Harry. He remembered that spot with full force—Harry, it's a portkey. Cedric's voice was echoing in his ear like it was yesterday.

"SHUT UP!" a voice called from somewhere far off in the darkness. "If you don't stop crying right now—"

"Ginny!" Harry gasped.

"—I will Crucio your ass, Lucius," said Rebekah.

Draco giggled.

"I am so sick of you two," Lucius sneered.

"Oh, shut up," they said in unison.

"Someone get the girl," said Alex.

"Bloody Whorecruxes," said Lucius, walking farther and farther away. Still, out in the cemetery, Ron, Hermione, Harry, and Draco could not see them.

"The Dark Lord wouldn't appreciate you talking to us that way, Lucius," said Rebekah.

Harry, suddenly, saw the windows of what was unmistakably the Riddle house.

"Whoa," said Draco.

"Look at that," said Hermione. Ron's face was blank, dumbfounded. There was a light coming from a window on the third floor, and Harry automatically sprang forward.

"Harry, no!" Hermione hissed. Draco grabbed the back of his shirt. Harry slapped his hand away.

"Don't touch me!"

"She's right, you know," said Draco. "If you go in there—those girls aren't exactly beginners at unforgivable curses."

"How would you know?" asked Ron.

"Alex likes to Crucio people," he said. "Thought it was kinky."

"Ew," said Hermione.

"Right," tried Ron. Hermione slapped him.

"We have to get in somehow," said Harry, growing more and more annoyed with each passing second. "We have to get to her somehow—"

"Well I think we should go in the servant's door—" Tried Draco.

"Servant's door—" Hermione scoffed.

"Yes, servant's door—"

"What about in through the—" Ron started.

"There's no such thing as a serv—"

"Hello," said Draco, pointing to himself. "I'm the Pure-Blood here."

"HEY!" said Ron. "I'm a—"

"Shush!" said Harry. "Quit arguing!"

"LUCIUS!" Rebekah screamed. "WHAT. IS. THE HOLD UP?"

"Sodding Malfoys," Alex grumbled.

"Harry!" said Hermione. "Not now—"

"Alex." said Rebekah, with a tone in her voice undeniably like urgency. "Shush."

Harry, Hermione, Draco, and Ron all got insanely quiet, trying not to breathe, or move, or make any sound at all.

"Get the girl," said Rebekah. "GO!"

Harry sprang out from behind the tombstone and ran forward at full speed.

"HARRY!" The three behind him screamed.

"LUCIUS!" Alex screamed. "LUCIUS, GET THE GIRL! IT'S POTTER! POTTER AND THE BRATS GO!"

"ALEX!" Rebekah screamed. "GET TO THE TOMBSTONE AND TAKE HER TO THE—"

"MANSFIELD!" Harry screamed. "MANSFIELD!"

Rebekah fell silent.

"YOU CAN'T HIDE HER FROM ME!"

"DON'T BE SO PATHETIC, POTTER!" she shouted back.

"WHEN I FIND YOU, YOU BITCH—"

"DRACO!" Alex shouted. "YOU FRUITCAKE WHEN I CATCH YOU!"

"YOU'LL DO WHAT? TELL MY FATHER?"

"YOU'RE NO SON OF MINE!" Lucius shouted.

Harry and the three behind him ran until they saw a brief glimpse of Alex, with her wand raised, waiting before them—she saw them, and disappeared into the haze.

"This is fun," Draco gasped. "We should do this more often. I love chasing after dangerous witches in the middle of the night."

"Oh, sod off Draco," said Harry.

Suddenly, he heard a voice that made his heart freeze.

"Harry!"

His mind came to a halt.

"Ginny? Ginny, where are you?"

"Harry!" Ginny cried. "Harry! Go back! Harry you have to go back!"

"I'm not going anywhere, Ginny!"

Suddenly, Ginny screamed an ear-splitting, horrible scream.

Harry pushed farther and farther on, but it was too dark to see anything. Behind him, Hermione collapsed. Ron went back for her, but Draco and Harry kept running.

"IT'S TOO LATE, POTTER!" Alex taunted. "IT'S OVER! SHE BELONGS TO THE DARK LORD NOW!"

"YOU DIRTY BIT—" Draco started.

"DRACO, YOU SISSY—" Lucius screamed.

"YOU WOULD KNOW!"

"OUCH!"

"YOUR MOM!"

"I'M GOING TO MAKE HER SUFFER, POTTER," Rebekah screamed. "I'M GOING TO TORTURE HER, AND THEN WE'RE BOTH GOING TO KILL HER!"

"GINNY!" Harry screamed.

"HARRY NO!"

Suddenly, Harry heard a voice that made his voice crawl.

"Hello Harry," said the icy, bone-chilling voice of Bellatrix Lestrange. "Know that she will suffer greatly at the hands of the Dark Lord, Potter! It's going to take more than a couple of teenagers to save her from the Dark Lord's wra—!"

"BELLATRIX!" Harry shouted into the darkness. "WHEN I FIND YOU, I AM GOING TO—"

"To kill me, Harry? Little baby Potter is going to kill me?"

Harry sprang forward through the fog, and, finally catching a glimpse of her—

"ARGH!" they both screamed at once.

She waved her wand in the air, and nearly screamed Avada Kedavra, when Harry knocked her onto the ground.

"GET OFF ME!" She hissed, digging her nails into his scalp. He pointed his wand at her face, but her free arm sprang up and hit him—her wand was in her right hand, he took it and slammed her wrist as hard as he could into the tombstone next to them. With a frightening crack, her wand broke in half.

"YOU LITTLE—!"

"STUPEFY!" Harry screamed.

Bella fell silent, her eyes rolled back in her head, and she collapsed onto the ground.

Draco appeared behind him, pulled Harry up by the collar of his shirt, and the two boys continued to run.

Suddenly, everything seemed to go silent. Harry's scar seared with pain, but he could not feel himself scream.

Draco pulled him through the rest of the fog, and suddenly, they were standing in a round courtyard, in front of a tombstone that haunted Harry's memories.

Ginny was lying at the base, arms chained to the Riddle tombstone with some kind of magical chain that curled and moved as if it was a snake. Rebekah and Alex were nowhere to be found.

Behind you.

The voice whispering in his mind was strangely familiar.

Harry whirled, threw up his wand, and—

"EXPELLIARMUS!"

"SERPENSORTIA!"

"OPPUGNO!"

Their wands, like Voldemort and Harry's wands had done in his fourth year, connected. Draco fell back on the ground, dumbfounded.

"Phoenix?" Harry asked breathlessly.

Alex and Rebekah's eyes were wide with horror, but they answered, just as breathlessly.

"Unicorn," said Rebekah.

"Dragon," said Alex.

"What—" Rebekah started. She looked desperate. "What's happening—?"

There was a string of magic flowing from all of their wands, each a different color; Rebekah's was pale silver, Alex's was green, and Harry's was bright as a red flame.

Harry heard himself, as if from some distant memory, screaming "SIRIUS! SIRIUS NO!"

There was a shadow of a man hovering over them, eyes gaunt and hollow. Suddenly, the light changed, and he was white and blinding.

The man faded, and a snake curled it's ugly head in the air.

I will kill her, Harry.

Parsletongue.

I will kill her.

The snake curled as if to strike—Harry heard Rebekah sob, and it vanished.

Harry, said another voice, as clear as a summer day. Harry, there is only one way you can save her.

"How," Harry asked aloud. The memory of the voice was hovering over them like a pleasant dream.

"NO!" Alex was crying, staring up at the man.

Dumbledore.

Save her with your love, Harry. Save her.

With one horrible, potentially fatal jerk, Harry pulled his wand away—the magic, floating in the air, with no other place to go, split forward—Harry ducked, but Alex and Rebekah didn't have the time to think. They both flew backwards, hit with the different effects of their different spells. Ginny, at this exact moment, screamed in horror and pain.

"GINNY, NO!"

Her scream tore through the Earth like a plague.

"GINNY!"

His scar suddenly seared like it had never hurt him before. He felt as if his body was being torn in two as he fell forwards, screaming with Ginny as one.

"ALEX!" Rebekah screamed. She was holding herself up across the courtyard, magic still swirling around her, holding her hand over her left eye, where her skin seemed to have turned into scales. "GO NOW!"

Harry heard the crack as they disapparated, and hate scorched his veins.

"Harry," a voice called softly—the sound splitting in his mind was so deafening, he was surprised he could hear her. Ginny—she was alive. His body coursed with warmth at the sound of her voice.

And just like that, the pain left him.

His body lost it's rigidity, the swirling magic that filled the air in the graveyard lifted, and Harry and Ginny both collapsed on the ground.

Harry slowly opened his eyes and glanced across from him where Ginny lay—her body was changed. Her stomach was smooth and flat once more, like it had been, and she wasn't moving. She was lying on the ground as still as the cemetery itself, curled into a ball. The magical chains were gone.

"Ginny—!"

She gasped for air.

Relief filled him.

"Ugh," said Draco, sitting up. "What on Earth happened—?"

"Shut up—"

Somewhere farther out in the cemetery, Harry heard Hermione scream.

"Oh God," said Harry. "Bellatrix."

There was another crack, and they all flinched. Was that—?

"A gunshot," said Harry, sitting up quickly. Ginny stood up shakily, and Draco stood up as well in the back, confused.

"A what—?"

Harry took off running into the darkness, afraid of what he would find. But he had only heard one gunshot—surely, if it had been Bella...

"Harry, stop," said Hermione. She was sitting on the ground in the shade of a tombstone, with Ron at her side.

There was a body on the ground, and a man standing shakily in the dark, still holding the gun. Ron's wand flew up, and—

"Stupefy!"

The man fell to the ground. His hat rolled off his head and over to Harry's feet; on it was stitched "Security". Harry turned to the body.

"Harry, don't," said Hermione, smothering a sob. "It's Bellatrix, she—"

Hermione didn't need to explain.

"Let's get out of here," said Harry, grabbing Ginny's hand.

They didn't need to be told twice.


	26. Pillowfights, Pregnancy, and a Conclusion

"Yeah, well, it turns out that the Dark Lord is pretty mad," said Dean. "I'm not sure anyone knows how," he said, frowning discouragingly. "But...well...you know...the Death Eaters have ways, apparently."  
"Hmm," said Harry. "But I thought...I mean, isn't that what...?"

"WHAT WE FREAKING DID?" Ginny pondered angrily.

"Well, it is the Dark Lord," said Dean. "You can't just wave a wand and get rid of him."

"Yeah," said Hermione. "It's kind of like Dumbledore said, isn't it? As long as there are people still living loyal to him, he will never truly be gone."

"That's a happy thought," said Harry. The teenagers were sitting inside the Three Broomsticks, enjoying some rest and relaxation. Hermione was very close to her due date, and would be leaving in a couple of days for St. Mungos.

"Well, that's exasperating," said Hermione.

Harry glared at her.

"Well...maybe exasperating isn't the right word..."

"Think so?" asked Harry.

"Can the both of you shut up," said Ginny, nearly growling at them. "I feel nauseous. My stomach hurts like the devil..."

"YOUR stomach hurts," said Hermione. "YOUR stomach. My stomach is the one with the BABY in it..."

"YES WELL MY STOMACH WAS THE ONE WITH THE FETUS OF VOLDEMORT IN IT, SO WHY DON'T YOU JUST BUGGER OFF..."

"WELL I'M THE ONE WITH WEASLEY SPAWN IN..."

"Hey," said Ron, growing red in the face. He had tried, for the most part, to stay out of fights with Hermione for the last few days of her pregnancy, but it was a little much for him.

"Hey, girls, neither of you is better than the other..."

"I'VE BEEN POSSESSED BY TOM RIDDLE TOO..."

"I FOUGHT...WELL, I'VE BEEN..."

"My parents were killed by Voldemort," said Harry, trying to get them to shut up.

"I'm poor," said Ron.

"We're both poor, idiot," said Ginny.

Seamus, Dean, Lavender, Parvati, Luna, Fred, and George were all sitting across from them, shooting the two girls scared looks.

"I'm sick of fighting about this," she said. "I'm pregnant and alone and I DON'T CARE."

"Hermione, you're not alone," said Ron, looking angry.

"SHUT UP, RON," she said, looking close to tears.

Ron rolled his eyes, but he did it so she couldn't see.

"Just wait Harry," Ron whispered to him. "After she has this baby she'll be back to her moderately angry self."

"Fun," said Harry.

Harry, Seamus, Ron and Dean all smuggled some firewhiskey to enjoy tonight, since it was their last day at Hogwarts for the year.

"Somebody please explain to me exactly what a 'whorecrux' is," said Parvati, frowning.

"I think," said Harry, "but I'm not sure, that it's a carrier of the Dark Lord."

Ginny slapped him.

"WELL I DIDN'T SAY YOU WERE A WHORECRUX ON PURPOSE," Harry argued.

"Besides...if Voldemort had succeeded in you, he would be a lot more stronger then he'd ever be in Alex or Rebekah."

"Why's that?" asked Dean.

Ginny hugged him.

"Well," said Harry. "They're in his service. And besides, Ginny and I are much better together than we are apart."

"That's true," said Ginny. "We do make one attractive couple."

She smiled evilly at Romilda Vane, who was walking passed them at that very moment...frowning, as she always did, at Ginny and Harry together.

"Yeah, well, there's no way you're better looking than me and Ron," said Hermione. "I mean...I may be pregnant, but we're still on fire."

"Sure you are," said Seamus, with his own arm around Lavender.

"Well," said Harry, as they walked back to Hogwarts. "That was sufficiently awkward. I'm going to go shag your sister now, Ron."

Ron narrowed his eyes.

"Asshole."

"You're just upset because Hermione is too pregnant for that sort of thing," Ginny said.

"So what if she is?" Ron said.

"I won't be for long," she said. "But now that I'm THIS far along..."

"There is NO WAY we're stopping," said Ron. "NO. WAY."

"Ugh, well," she said, but she didn't look entirely displeased.

When they reached the castle, Hermione, Lavender, Ginny, Parvati, and Draco all went into the girl's dormitory to finish packing and talk.

"We don't," Hermione had said, "expect to stay up late, so don't get your hopes up."

The boys acted disappointed, but this is what they had been hoping for.

"Next year," said Dean, holding up his bottle of Firewhiskey, "we are seventh years."

They all cheered at this, and took another drink of the alcohol that burned their throats.

"Think about how much we've all changed," said Seamus, sitting up. "I mean...at the beginning of the year, Dean was dating Ginny..."

"That was a disaster," he said nervously, not looking at Ron.

"And nobody knew Ron was dating Hermione..."

"I don't think there was too much actual 'dating' involved," said Harry.

"Yeah, well," said Ron. "If you think about it, we really didn't have to date, because we've been friends nearly forever. I didn't know she was so sexually frustrated."

"Only with you," said Harry. "I saw her kiss Krum once. She looked like she was in pain."

"Good," said Ron, leaning back in his chair in a very smug, self-satisfied way. "I always knew she wanted me."

Harry, Dean and Seamus all choked back laughter.

"Yeah right," said Seamus. "We could ALL tell you wanted her, and that she wanted you back..."

"We heard how much you wanted her, actually, several times."

Ron turned red.

"You liars," he said.

"You can't control what you say in your sleep, Ron," said Harry. "Or what you...do."

They laughed.

"Ooh," Dean mimicked. "Ooh, Hermione. YES! YES! MORE! YES!"

Ron threw a pillow at him. Dean threw it back...it missed, and hit Seamus. Seamus threw it back at Dean...Dean tried to hit Ron again, it worked.

"Guys," said Harry. They all threw pillows at him.

Soon, it was all out pillow fight war.

"Son of a b..." said Harry, as Dean attacked him with a pillow. Ron was hitting Seamus, who was trying to scramble out of the way. Quite suddenly:

"Ahem."

In the downfall of pillow-stuffing and high spirits, they saw Hermione standing in the doorway wearing a bathrobe and a frown.

"You guys are stupid."

"Thanks, Hermione," said Ron, looking embarrassed.

"We were just talking about how Ron had dirty dreams about you, Hermione," said Seamus.

Hermione cracked a smile.

"Did he? Well, he wasn't the only one dreaming."

The boys all looked scandalized. Ron looked smug, again.

"Harry, I just thought I should prepare you..."

"HARRY!"

Whoever had called his name...Ginny, it sounded like...was screaming his name. She did not sound happy.

"HARRY, WHEN I FIND YOU...!"

"Well, you see, Harry, Ginny's a little mad."

"A little?" Harry asked. "What about?"

"DAMMIT, HARRY!" Ginny screamed, suddenly appearing. She looked livid. "DAMMIT!"

Harry sat down in his chair as she came towards him, a crazy look flashing in her eyes.

"I FINALLY GET RID OF IT AND NOW YOU DO THIS TO ME!"

She held up something. It looked remarkably like...

"Uh oh," said Harry.

Ron snatched it out of her hand.

"What's this?" he asked, staring at it.

"Ron," said Hermione, pulling him away, snatching it out of his hand, and tossing it back to Ginny. "Don't."

"It's a PREGNANCY TEST!" Ginny bellowed. "A PREGNANCY TEST! And GUESS WHAT IT SAYS?"

Ron's expression was blank.

"Harry," he said. Harry could see the edges of his ears getting red, as they always did when he was embarrassed or angry.

"Ron...Ginny, please," Harry tried. "I mean, it wasn't even my fault! You were the one..."

"DON'T BLAME THIS ON ME!"

"Well, it's just that you wanted to..."

"Where's my wand?" Ron asked, looking around the room.

Harry ran for it.

"Ron, don't be silly," Hermione said.

"Hermione...!"

"NO," she said. "Let's go somewhere and talk."

"I don't want to talk, Hermione, I just want to kill him..."

Harry walked out to the courtyard and sat, trying to collect his thoughts. Ginny...and him...but they had been so careful. And he knew that she was bound to be upset, but why was she so incredibly upset?

"Harry?"

It was Luna, behind him, looking dazed as usual.

"What are you doing out here?"

"Sitting," he said.

"Oh," she said, sitting next to him on the bench. "I was just taking a walk."

"Oh," he said.

There was an awkward silence.

"Harry," said Luna. "Well, there's something I think you should know. Severus would think it's unwise, but...well, I was asking for a sign, and here you are, and..."

She trailed off.

"Harry?" she asked, looking desperate.

"Yes?"

"I'm pregnant."

Harry stared at her, looking for some sign of a joke in her eyes. But she was close to tears, waiting for his response.

"Luna?"

"Yes?"

"Remember how...a long time ago, I mean...you asked me to call you mommy?"

"No," she said. "I said I'm your new mommy. There's a difference."

"Well," said Harry. "You're also going to be a grandmother."

She stared at him. Confused.

"What?" Her tone was awful flat.

"Well," said Harry. "Ginny...she's...well, you know. And...I'm the father."

She was still staring at him, confused.

"Go to your room."

Harry nearly swallowed his tongue.

"What?"

"I SAID GO TO YOUR ROOM."

"But...but Ron's trying to kill me..."

"YOU BETTER HOPE IT'S RON, BECAUSE WHEN YOUR FATHER HEARS ABOUT THIS..."

"Luna," said Harry. "Not so loud!"

"I SAID GO TO YOUR ROOM!" she screeched.

"Fine," Harry said. "Gawd."

Harry walked back towards Gryffindor tower, feeling depressed. Now even Snape knew about him and Ginny...

Which is why Harry was surprised and relieved to find Ginny sitting outside of the tower, looking unhappy and guilty, sitting on the floor with her arms wrapped around her knees. The fat lady was saying something sympathetic, but Ginny did not appear to be cheered.

"Oh," said Harry, a little uneasy.

Ginny looked up.

"Harry," she said. Her eyes were very red.

Harry walked across the room and sat down next to her, unsure of what she would do but not really caring.

"I'm sorry, Harry," she said once he was seated. "I didn't...I mean, I didn't mean what I said before about...our...situation. I'm sorry."

"It's alright, Ginny," he said.

"But the way I yelled at you, in front of everyone. Like I thought it was going to be like it was, with...Voldemort. Like it wasn't completely different..."

"It's ok," he said, staring at her. "I understand."

She put her head on his shoulder, still feeling depressed.

"Harry..."

The door opened.

"Oh," said Ron, sticking his head out. "Harry, er...well..."

He sounded upset.

"Well, I think you'd better...well, I think we need to go to St. Mungos now."

Harry and Ginny stared.

"What?" they said in unison.

"Well, Hermione and me were...well, you know, like we always do, and Hermione

suddenly...AND I THINK IT'S TIME TO GO NOW."

"Ron, Ginny," said Harry. "I know this isn't the best time, but...Luna's pregnant too."

"Are you serious?" Ginny said.

"No," said Harry, pointing at himself. "HARRY. I'm HARRY."

"No, not SIRIUS BLACK, I meant are you serious. Serious? You know? Serious?"

"Yeah?" asked a strangely familiar male voice.

TO BE CONTINUED...


End file.
